


Hero for Hire

by Legs (InsanityRule)



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Bad coping mechanisms, Blood, Drug Use, Future Fic, Gen, Gun For Hire, I don't know what happened this popped into my head a couple days ago and dug in, I swear to fuck I'll make you all love Fries & Crane friendship if it kills me, M/M, Science, Some very blase attitudes towards death, Some very minor additional characters but most hardly get any actual screentime, fatalistic humor, in a vague sense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-19
Updated: 2018-11-21
Packaged: 2019-04-24 20:15:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 42,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14362806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InsanityRule/pseuds/Legs
Summary: Victor Fries manages a very successful personal business contracting himself and his unique skills out to the highest paying rogue, at least until Bruce Wayne starts out bidding everyone else.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I can't tell you how many re-writes the summary needed to not sound like the start of a porno.
> 
> This is an idea I don't have fully fleshed out but I know the vibe and the general direction so we'll all just see where this goes together. Welcome to niche fic hell with me.

One of the few benefits of having to wear his suit means Victor can sneak a pair of earplugs into his ears and claim he’s fussing with some tubing or coolant, and no one has the know-how to call him out on it as he blocks a stream of tirades from reaching his eardrums.

Monologues, he really can’t stand a boss that monologues. Gotham’s underworld is thick with this nonsense, and the one flimsy benefit is the puffed up speeches usually add an extra ten minutes or so to his work hours, which means slightly more pay.

Most of the time it’s not worth the mental anguish, hence the earplugs.

Whatever the guy’s saying today is really getting the troops riled up. Unnecessarily, since tonight’s plan was set in stone three days ago. It’s frenzy for frenzy’s sake, and he can’t be bothered to feign excitement.

Victor slides his red tinted goggles down over his eyes so his boss can’t see the way his eyes are about rolling back into his skull. Dryness, he’ll say. Or maybe the heat’s getting to them. If their money’s good they’ll take whatever he says at face value.

There’s a soft vibrating around his hip from the proxy text alert he rigged up, and Victor ducks out of the main room of the warehouse to check his phone. It’s Penguin, thank fuck, and he’s sent Victor an offer he can’t refuse, at least until someone else sends a better one.

_ I’ll increase what that bumbling bibliophile is paying you by 10%. _

Victor sends back an amount, with a small service charge for having to do the math in his head. $ _ 20,500 _ .

_ Done. When we’re successful you’ll get a bonus. _

He likes the sound of that. Victor switches from his messages to his pay app and refreshes the recent transactions page until Penguin’s payment shows up in his account.

“Thank God,” he mutters. He tears out the earplugs and pushes up his goggles, hand waving his phone in the air like a flag as he approaches the rambunctious crowd. “Offer’s been beat, I’m out.”

Bookworm- and Jesus if Victor didn’t about have an aneurysm the first time this guy’s name showed up in his contact list- stops his long-winded speech dead and gapes at him.

“Yeah, no hard feelings. Beat he current top offer and I’m yours again.” Victor slips his phone back into its pocket and sends himself off with a two fingered salute. “Later.”

-

Victor drops the bank bag of untraced bills and his freeze gun on the counter by the door. He pulls his phone out before moving on to his suit; it’s a bitch to get in and out of quickly and the minute it’s off it’s off for the night, maybe longer if no decent offers come through.

Nothing but a quick message from Penguin about his bonus, which was already placed in his bank bag before he left the Lounge. He tosses the phone by his payment and weapon and begins peeling away the layers until he’s down to his underwear, and he takes a few moments to savor the way the treated air in his lab feels refreshing after having to sit in his own recycled hell for ten hours straight.

Before dealing with his suit and his things he strides over to a free standing canister of liquid helium and lets a quick burst free to bring down his temperature from bearable to actually feeling close to pleasant. It adds another millimeter or so to the ever growing patch of opaque ice hanging from the ceiling. Eventually he’ll need to invest some time into chipping it off so it doesn’t tear down a part of the ceiling once it gets too heavy.

He picks up his weapon and the bank bag, leaving his suit in a heap by the door. Things to do, payments to make, and the suit isn't going anywhere. As an afterthought he does turn around and grab his phone, which still has no new messages but is whining about low battery after a day full of bidding wars for his highly demanded services.

Victor connects his phone to the charging dock on his desk and leans his weapon against the side. He opens up the bank bag and upends the contents onto the surface and starts separating the bills out into stacks of one hundred.

It's $2,000, not even ten percent, but it's always been about the gesture than the actual size of the bonus, and if anyone else had raised the nightly bid higher there wouldn't even be a bonus to scoff at. He stacks each pile together into one larger one and pushes his chair back to kneel on the floor so he can reach the safe behind the sliding panel in the back.

Victor unlocks the safe and grabs a small stack of bills separate from the rest of the stacks and removes the rubber band around the middle. He changes the amount on top from 4,300 to 6,300 and rebands it before placing it off to the side and locking the safe.

There's a soft ping from above him and Victor reaches up blindly, smacking his hand over the surface until he finds the charging dock for his phone and drags it closer to the edge. Too close. It falls off the edge and clatters on the floor, and he sighs tiredly and drags it over. The phone’s reinforcements held, but there's a tiny crack on the charging dock.

“Well fuck you too,” he mutters. He moves so he's sitting under his desk with his back against one of the sides. He opens his messages and one, no now it's two, messages from Penguin.

_ Urgent job name price. _

_!!!!!!!??! _

He sighs and starts typing a response, and three letters into the word 'what’ his phone starts ringing.

“No no no,” he groans. He hesitates to accept Penguin's call, but ultimately he does and holds the phone up to his ear. “I said no calls.”

“And  _ I  _ said I had an urgent job for you!” Penguin shrieks. Victor holds his phone away from his ear and grimaces. “I think urgency constitutes a deviation from the norm.”

He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Not your employee. Not at your beck and call.”

“But you  _ are  _ interested in more money I assume?”

Victor sighs. He's not wrong. “Why's it so urgent.”

“Thank you,” Penguin starts. “It's urgent because it's happening tonight whether I want it to or not.”

“Pass,” he says.

“I,” he sputters, “I haven't even said what the job  _ is _ !”

“It's at night, you don't want it to happen, I can make a few guesses.” One. He'll make one guess if he has to, and he'll be right.

“I am offering to let you name your price now if you'll just let me tell you what it is-”

“What's Riddler doing now,” he deadpans.

“He,” Penguin sighs, “there's this traveling exhibit downtown. It's some antique puzzle box or something like that.”

Victor lets that hang in the air for a bit before asking, “you want to pay me to get your boyfriend a box?”

“I want to pay you to keep the GCPD's grubby hands off him. Now name your price.”

Victor lets his phone drop to his chest and he thinks. He's already out of his suit, so that's a big negative. Name your price is a big positive though, and Penguin's pockets are deep. He picks his phone back up. “So you're against me just freezing his legs to keep him from doing this?”

“Do you want the job or not!?” he shouts. Loudly. This is why he doesn't do phone calls.

“Any price?” he asks, and Penguin's assault on his eardrums peters off. “A million.”

There's a rather long silence on the other end, and Victor contemplates ending the call more than once, but eventually Penguin finds his shouty little voice again. “Are you being serious?”

“I named a price. He worth it?”

Penguin starts sputtering and Victor moves the phone away in anticipation of another shout fest. “You can not be serious! A million!? I might as well  _ let  _ him get arrested and bribe the entire GCPD!”

“So why don't you.”

“It's,” Penguin's probably spitting all over the mouthpiece of his phone with as much as he's sputtering, “I don't have to hire you, you know. Now that would be satisfying, watching your business venture crumble because you've finally pushed away your best paying client.”

“It wouldn't crumble,” he says plainly. As fun as this is it's getting tedious. “Ten.”

“Ten  _ what _ ?”

“Thousand.”

Penguin scoffs. “Really? Would that be so hard to  _ lead  _ with?”

“Maybe you're easy to fuck with.” And Penguin tries to refute the claim but Victor isn't listening. He crawls out from under his desk and pushes himself up off the floor. “Send the details, and then the money. I can be anywhere in Gotham in a little over an hour.”

“What? You don't do anything. Why an hour?”

Rude, but accurate. “I haven't eaten.”

“Oh for, fine. Eat. He's not planning on doing anything until  _ midnight _ ,” Penguin groans. “How much would he hate me if I agreed to your leg plan?”

“Don't know. Don't really care.” He hangs up, and despite Penguin's grumbling texts another $10,000 shows up in his account.

-

“And then you twist this knob a quarter turn clockwise, which is indicated by this particular pattern of leaves-”

Victor turns to Penguin and whispers, “he does know we’re not really listening right?”

“Shush,” Penguin waves him off. “Let him just get that out of his system, please.” Penguin glances back at Riddler, who’s currently marveling at a small box he’s freed from the larger puzzle box. “I trust there weren’t any complications this evening?”

“It’s the middle of the night,” Victor corrects him. Penguin, who was starting to pull out an envelope from his coat, slides it back in and glares. “No. There were no complications while we stole his worthless box.”

“That worthless box is going to sate his desire to add to his collection for at least a couple  _ weeks _ ,” Penguin says. This time he does finish pulling the envelope out of his coat and slaps it into Victor’s outstretched hand. “A thank you,” he says, “for continuing to keep the past behind us where it belongs. No hard feelings.”

Victor pulls open the unstuck flap of the money envelope and glances at the contents inside. He doesn’t bother counting now; it’s at most another thousand. He looks to Penguin again, and over to Riddler still pouring over his new treasure, and back again. “There’s still some hard feelings.”

“Right,” Penguin smiles, mirthless. “I suppose I can live with that if you can.”

“Sure,” he says as he pockets the bonus. “So we’re done?”

“Actually,” Riddler pops over and does this odd little gesture with his hands like he’s presenting himself for display. “I  _ do  _ have another ocularly pleasing item I’ve been  _ eyeing _ .”

“Ed!” Penguin squawks. “No!”

“It’s a painting,” he explains, with his hands as much as his words, “a Maze.”

“For the- you don’t need a painting of a  _ maze _ ,” Penguin chides him.

“Not  _ a maze _ , Maze! The impressionist!”

Victor does his damndest to tune out the rest of their senseless argument. He always forgets this part, and forgets to up his prices whenever Penguin’s demanding he keep Riddler out of Arkham. An extra fee for the pain and suffering of enduring their bickering.

“I’m out,” he says. Penguin waves him off without bothering to look over; Riddler is too focused on whatever point he’s trying to make. Victor rolls his eyes as he turns to leave. “If there’s a job send me the details. Or don’t. Up to you.”

-

“Do you want to try  _ doing  _ something ice cube!?”

“I'll consider it,” Victor says calmly even as a bullet whizzes past. The rest of his current crew is cowering behind a few wooden supply crates filled with something he's supposed to be escorting out of Two Face’s warehouse for Kiteman (Jesus this city sometimes), and Victor is content to stand behind a tall metal transport crate, since the metal has a bit better chance of sending bullets flying in directions that aren't at him. His proxy buzzes against his side and he pulls his phone out to read the message.

“Are you going to do anything!? The boss paid good money to get your help out here!”

“He did.” Victor shoots a quick reply,  _ $15,000 _ , and refreshes his money app until it appears. “But Two Face paid better.” He fires off two shots of his freeze gun at his former team and a third blast up to the lookout on the upper galley. His momentum carries him over the edge and sends him smashing against the ground, sending hundreds of little frozen pieces flying.

“Oops,” he deadpans as he steps out with his hands up, his left still holding the phone.

“Guns down!” Two Face shouts, half their face pulled up in a wild smile and the other calm and collected. “Glad you could join us.”

“Pay’s right,” Victor says. He slips his phone back in its place and settles back on one hip with his gun cradled in both hands. “In Kiteman’s defense he thought you two were out at the pier.”

Two Face does this thing, this wheezy chortle, and Victor's good at hiding how disgusting it is to see the mangled half twist up like it is but only for so long. Having his goggles down helps.

“Our  _ men  _ are down at the pier, getting us some weapon shipments.”

“Smart,” he says. Exaggerates, really. It's probably more dumb luck than anything since Two Face loves being in the thick of it all. “So, this job is done. They wanted your stuff, I defended it.”

“Yeah yeah.” Two Face waves him off and reaches into their pockets to pull out their signature coin. “We might have another job for you. A doubling of your usual pay grade.”

Victor never holds his breath over this. He's already essentially been paid twice. Having half the day to work in his lab is hardly a wash. “Send me the details and the cash if it happens.” He steps over the slowly thawing shatters of a man and continues towards the open delivery door.

“We're all here now,” Two Face calls after him.

“Not how it works,” he calls back. “Send it,” he taps at the pocket holding his phone, “and we'll talk."

-

There's a morbid appeal to turf wars in Gotham's underworld. He can top $35,000 if enough rogues are paying attention to his involvement. Two Face started things off with a bang, probably hoping his start of $20,000 would deter any sway bids from piling in the moment Victor started freezing over Penguin's foot soldiers.

In Two Face’s defense, they aren't even fighting over Penguin's turf, just some area  _ next  _ to it, so he probably didn't expect Penguin to drop $30,000 without missing a beat. Probably doesn't help that Riddler's little hermit hole is smack dab in the middle of the warehouses, something Two Face is, mostly likely, not aware of.

Victor keeps part of his attention tuned into his phone even as he starts freezing Two Face’s goons in place. He wants a new centrifuge, something with a bit more capacity and durability. A few extra thousand in the bank never hurts.

And there's the vibrate, and another $20,000 in his account. “Better type fast,” he says to Penguin as he swivels, phone still out. Penguin starts fumbling with his pockets like a madman. “Three, two-”

There's a chime, and Victor blinks and turns his phone back around. A message, unknown number,  _ I have an offer for you I think you'll be interested in taking. - BW _

“BW,” he mutters, and types back,  _ Bookworm did you change numbers again? _

_ No. _

Great, and unhelpful, unless you're Penguin because he shouts with triumph and another $20,000 shows up in his account. “Now get to firing!”

“Fine,” he sighs, and he blasts enough ice to make a temporary wall between the actual territory and the fight. “Happy? I need to look at something.”

“I am paying you-!”

“Active offer. Just yell. I can shoot from here.”

Penguin fumes but he nods, leaning forward over his little perch on the second floor of the Lounge and firing off a weapon of his own. Victor slides his goggles up and reads the newest message from this BW character.

_ I'm willing to offer $60,000 for your loyalty tonight. Do you have a preferred method of payment? _

Victor blinks in surprise. Combining Penguin and Two Face's offers he's at that for the night, but no one ever goes above $50,000 for a single job.  _ You have my attention. What's the job? _

Some clattering on the fire escape makes Victor look up from his phone as Riddler comes barreling up the rusty ladder and stairs, and then he ducks his head again when those two start flailing about Two Face and shrieking. He'll remember the surcharge, he  _ has  _ to.

_ It relates to your current job. Is that the highest bid? _

_ Yes, currently _ . Whoever this new deep-pockets person is doesn't need to know Two Face caps out at $40,000. Two of two sort of thing. Any more factors and suddenly he's nearly paying Victor the price of one frozen Penguin.  _ If you're that interested just send it here, _ and he includes the information for his pay app.

He refreshes it a few times, keeping an eye out for this mystery payment, when $80,000 lands in his account and he about drops his phone.

_ I've included a bit of a buffer with the discussed amount in case anyone else still has interest. _

Victor types and erases a response multiple times before just asking,  _ what are the details? _

Honestly this is nearing territory where he'll agree to something really reprehensible. Victor adds the number into his contacts while he waits for a reply under the name 'BW moneybags’.

_ Leave the fight. _

Victor eyes the duo to his right, watching them continue to fuss and whine (at a much more bearable volume) over Riddler's hideout.  _ Are you here? _

_ Not in person. _ Victor looks over the second floor balcony at the people below, expecting a wave maybe? But no one tries to get his attention.

Weird.

_ So you want me to just… walk away? _

“You know you could actually _do_ something to help!” Penguin squawks.

“Shut up,” he says. The twin gasps of shock is a nice touch. They always act so offended. It’s just business. “Got a higher bid.”

“From  _ who _ ?”

Victor shrugs. It's apparently not enough for Penguin and Riddler but he has a new message.  _ I have a vested interest in this fight ending as peaceful as possible. Your presence at the location complicates matters. _

He takes that as some sort of backhanded compliment.  _ Are we supposed to meet? _

_ Another day, perhaps. For now do as you please. _

“-and  _ another  _ thing, if I'm going to pay  _ good money- _ !”

“Someone bid $80,000. Your little hidey hole worth that?” Penguin's jaw about falls off. Riddler is less shellshocked, but also takes him literally.

“The value is,” Riddler stops and actually does some mental calculations, finger swiping around as if he's actually imputing them into something. Penguin smacks his arm lightly. “He  _ asked _ -”

“I'm not paying more than _$80,000_!”

“Oswald-”

“Look,” Victor raises his voice, a lot, and it gets their attention. “You got beat, you either pay more, or I go. That's how it works.” Silence. Finally. “Good.”

And he just leaves.


	2. Chapter 2

Penguin gets over hurt feelings pretty fast these days. A week after Victor makes out with nearly $200,000 he's messaging Victor incessantly about Ed's newest project and GCPD fingers and whatever else he deems necessary to send to Victor when he could just name a place and a price and he'd show.

Or he would, but his rep is coming by today.

_ Tomorrow _ .

And that's what it takes to make Penguin call him. Victor groans even as he accepts. “What.”

“I don't think you understand business.”

At least he's not yelling. “Look I have my centrifuge rep coming over today.” Now, actually. Some of the ice on his door cracks and falls to the floor as she knocks. “Just tell him to  _ wait _ and I can help tomorrow.”

“I don't think you know  _ Ed  _ very well,” Penguin snaps.

“I think I  _ do _ ,” he says. He opens the door and ushers her inside. “Sandra go to the lab.”

“Are you  _ entertaining _ right now!?”

“I'm having a meeting with my centrifuge rep. Phone's going off.” He hangs up and powers down his phone. Sandra's standing in the middle of his lab, bundled up in her winter gear and holding a tape measure and a clipboard. “Sorry. Job call.”

“Should we reschedule?”

“No.”

“Alright,” she says. She hands the clipboard to Victor and stretches her tape measure out around three feet. “I know you say this every time but can you please just put it in writing that the centrifuge has to be able to run in minus twenty? My bosses keep thinking I'm trying to fleece you.”

“Sure.” He writes  _ I'll die if it doesn't _ , crosses that out with a single line so it's still readable, and writes a bit more amicable explanation after. “Old one's in the corner.”

He pulls the cover off the dilapidated centrifuge and tosses it to the side. He kicks the frame around the exhaust and the vent cover pops off and clatters to the floor. Sandra sidesteps the fallen panel and tries to open the door, but the poor exhaust kept the condensation around the seal warm enough to stay liquid until it sat still for a half hour while he worked on something else. He doesn't remember what's inside anymore and honestly he's afraid to find out.

“It's frozen shut.”

“I can see that,” she sighs. “The exhaust?”

“Yep, it didn't vent outside so it condensed every time. It messed up this part of the wall too.” He points to the patch he had to replace after the corner tried to cave in on itself. “And even if it didn't do all that I could, you know, die.”

“Wouldn't want that,” she says offhandedly.  “I’ll get a few measurements taken and we’ll write up a quote.”

“I’ll be elsewhere,” he says. He doesn’t bother coming up with an excuse to leave the room, and she nods without turning away from her work.

There’s something to be said about professionals like Sandra. Too many of Victor’s old reps were too chatty. She asks just the right amount of questions, almost none, and the ones she does ask are about his new equipment.

He makes the life ruining mistake of grabbing his phone on his way out of the room and turns it on, and his budding curiosity and desire to offset the cost of his new equipment isn't enough to buoy his mood when he finds the dozen or so texts and three missed calls, all with a voicemail attached, all from Penguin about his “emergency" job.

“Great,” he mutters. He does the unthinkable, and undesirable, act of initiating the call. It's a concession. Penguin will preen over it later to Riddler and Victor's only out a little of his pride. Predictably, Penguin takes the bait and answers, but Victor one ups him and talks first. “Tell me why I don't have your number blocked.”

“I don't have time for this,  _ Victor. _ ” Penguin scolds, which is just rude because Victor's older than him by at least a couple years. “I can't talk him out of it. The job is happening tonight.”

Victor sighs slowly and rubs the bridge of his nose. “Are you saying you actually tried or is your phrasing for my benefit?”

“Yes, I  _ actually  _ tried, but he won't budge! He claims the date is significant for one of his  _ damn  _ riddles, and he refuses to wait a whole year for this piece.”

“I really hate themed villains,” Victor mutters, and more audibly to Penguin, “what piece and where?”

“It's a Maze.”

Victor doesn't say anything. He just slowly lowers his phone to his side and seriously contemplates throwing it in the trash and never leaving his lab again. Penguin's still sputtering, but none of the words are getting to Victor's ears, just the tone, and normally it would make him angry but he just feels tired.

“I really need a vacation,” he says wistfully. He lifts the phone back up and starts walking towards his suit. “So it's like a model of a maze?”

“No, its,- Ed will you sit down for  _ five minutes _ and  _ listen _ \- it's some painter being showcased at the museum. Last name of Maze, so of  _ course  _ Ed thinks he has to have some of his work.”

“Of course,” Victor deadpans. If he shows too much interest Penguin will take it as an invitation to  _ dish _ , and Victor does not want to get involved. “Look, I still need to put on my suit and talk to my rep. Can he at least wait until nightfall?”

“Give me a minute.” And then farther from the phone speaker but still very clear, “Ed I am conceding the  _ date _ but you are not doing this in broad daylight. Sundown. Yes I am being  _ serious _ \- look you are waiting until Victor is available. That's non-negotiable. I condone all your frivolous thievery if it makes you happy but not at the cost of your freedom and my sanity.” Victor never really knows what he’s supposed to do when he listens to this, so he sticks with wishing it would stop. “ _ Thank you _ . Victor? I will be needing your services this evening.”

“Is there any chance you could just hang up and text me this? I really don’t need to hear you mother the guy.”

“I do not  _ mother  _ anyone,” Penguin sniffs. “I’ll send you the details shortly.”

“It’s going to cost extra,” Victor adds in a rush, and then his phone beeps in his ear, signalling the call’s end. Before he can even lower his phone it vibrates in his hand with the details of Riddler’s little heist.  _ Gotham Art Museum - single painting, artist Maze, your role is purely protection - $20,000 _ .

Victor counters with, $ _ 25,000 - short notice fee _ , and a second message of,  _ if he tries to get me to riddle I’m adding more _ .

When Penguin sends back his acceptance of the additional charge and clause Victor nearly doesn’t send back his customary confirmation. Working with Penguin is… fine. It’s tolerable. He gets paid and Penguin’s generous enough with the tips, but Riddler, God, the guy isn’t even in this for profit. He’s just having  _ fun _ .

He’s a riddle obsessed magpie and his every attempt to get Victor to play along is almost too much to deal with even when he’s getting paid.

But last night’s haul is burning a hole in his pocket, and he’s running low on liquid helium. He can’t catch a break with the chemical dealer here in Gotham. Something about high insurance premiums. He wasn’t really paying attention.

He sends the confirmation Penguin’s way and refreshes his pay app until it appears. He really doesn’t know what Penguin sees in this guy.

“Must be a great lay, somehow,” he mutters to himself.

-

“And here!” Riddler exclaims, waving his hands theatrically and doing an actual damn  _ slide _ as he glides into the Maze exhibit. “If only he had a corn maze painting,” he groans. “Maze’s maize maze! It would be  _ perfect _ !”

“Will you just grab the damn thing?” Victor looks up at the iced over cameras and one frozen security guard, and then back at Riddler as he flounces up to one of the larger pieces (of course he goes for the biggest damn painting in the  _ room _ ) and starts kneeling around the frame. “That’s not grabbing.”

“They go all out for these traveling exhibits,” Riddler says with confidence. “Aha! Pressure alarm,” he grins, tapping the wall next to the bottom right corner. “They think they’re so clever.”

_ So do you _ , he thinks. He sighs and lets himself slouch against the far wall near another painting. Winterscape. It’s not half bad.

Partway into whatever Riddler thinks he’s doing to bypass the alarm Victor gets a text. He expels a loud breath and fishes it out, scrolling through a few alerts that don’t matter and a few emails about his chemical shipments. He expected it to be Penguin, guy can’t resist checking up when he’s not on the job with them, but it’s from good old Moneybags. He raises one brow, spares Riddler another glance, and turns his full attention to the message.

_ One of my contacts informed me you’re working again tonight. _

Victor nearly drops his phone and sidesteps into the middle of the room to scan for whatever camera he must have missed. He turns back to his phone and shoots off,  _ how’d you know that. _

_ I don’t want to reveal my sources _ , Moneybags sends back. Victor still doesn’t trust the room but he can’t find anything concrete unless it’s  _ Riddler _ , but he’s still tinkering around with the pressure alarm.  _ Since you didn’t deny my claim I’m assuming my source is correct _ . _ I’d like to extend you my offer from the other evening. _

_ Really? _ There’s this whoop of excitement from across the room as Riddler successfully removes the painting from the wall and nothing starts wailing or flashing.  _ Why? _

_ For now I’d like to continue to keep my intentions to myself. Tonight I’d like to offer double what you’ve been offered. I don’t require any services. _

_ I don’t really get it but okay. _ If this is an elaborate ruse he’s going to eat his phone. He types out,  _ that’s $50,000 _ , and starts refreshing his pay app. And there it is again, double what he’s been offered.

_ Enjoy your evening Mr. Fries. _

_ You too Moneybags _ , he sends back, feeling rather pleased over this new development. He can’t wait to break the news to Penguin.

He nearly texts him and splits, but he  _ knows  _ Penguin is going to end up calling so he saves himself the trouble. Penguin is, predictably, incensed over the implication. “What happened? Is he in jail? I paid you $25,000-”

“I got bought out. Double what you paid.”

He moves his phone away from his ear during Penguin’s silence, correctly anticipating the angry shriek and the tirade to follow. “What!? There’s no  _ competition  _ over this damn painting! Who the hell would buy you out!?”

“Dunno,” he says plainly. “They don’t even want the painting. Is this what it’s like to have a sugar daddy? Is there some sort of age cutoff for that?” he muses aloud, mostly for Penguin’s benefit. He smirks when Penguin sputters. “Not hearing a no.”

“I’m not even going to indulge such a ridiculous  _ fantasy _ ,” Penguin sniffs. “So you’re leaving, I assume?”

“That’s how it works.” Penguin mutters to himself a bit and Victor watches Riddler scamper over with his prize. “You’re on your own. Have fun carrying that.”

“What?” It’s the first time tonight he’s managed to shock Riddler, and honestly the guy’s deer in headlights look is one of the only things he looks forward to seeing when they work together. “But Oswald-”

“Got outbid.”

“I see.” His fingers flutter around the edges of the painting, and then he's hurriedly adjusting it in his arms to avoid damaging his “precious” Maze. “Is that him?” He nods to Victor's phone. “I need to talk to him.”

“Use your own,” Victor says, and he ends the call.

Riddler squawks, something very Penguin of him, and he gingerly sets the painting by his feet to pull out a bright green phone and call Penguin. Victor turns to leave, ignoring the muttering and then animated whining going on behind him until it's directed at him. “Fries! Ten thousand!”

He stops dead in his path and tilts his ear back at Ed. “This isn't how it works.”

Ed grumbles obscenities and actually  _ sends a text  _ to Victor while they're twenty feet away. It's the only thing he'll admit to admiring about the guy; he has an appreciation for strange customs and rules. A message from That Green Fuckface pops up on his phone,  _ 10,000 of me are green but not with envy, disgust, or illness _ . _ \- I can be daring or panicked _ , and he stops reading.

“You have got to be kidding me.”

“ _ Oswald  _ was outbid, not me,” he counters, though uselessly, because Victor wasn’t protesting the  _ job _ , just the delivery of the information. “This is  _ my  _ job request, independent of his.”

“Not really,” Victor says, “but it isn’t a side flip so,” he pauses, “how about $15,000? I told Penguin I add surcharges if there’s a riddle.”

Riddler grumbles but taps away on his phone, and Victor refreshes the pay app a few times until the amount appears. “Fine, you got me until you’re out of the building.”

-

_ I think it's about time we meet face to face. _

Victor's been rereading the text from Moneybags all morning, typing out and erasing replies before getting through the first word, and just generally agonizing about the endless ways first meetups can and will go wrong in a city like Gotham.

He settles on a mild threat.  _ You know it's illegal for the GCPD to hire criminals. _

_ The GCPD and I are not affiliated _ , is the instant reply. Guy must have been hovering.

_ So is this some weird power grab? _

_ You could say that _ , is the eventual reply.  _ You're vital to said grab, and I think it's time we discussed matters face to face. _

Victor groans. And things were going to  _ well  _ with this guy.  _ That's not really my style. _

_ I'm aware. I was hoping you would make an exception for me given my generosity. _

Victor snorts _. Let’s say I agree to this meet up. So you're going to tell me to come alone, no weapons, etc.?_

_ I don’t think that will be necessary. This is a professional meetup. _ Which, really, this isn’t any better than being told to come unarmed, but he’s not going to fall down the rabbit hole of some Scarecrow level psychological torment. He gets enough of that from Crane.  _ I’d prefer if we could meet out at the pier, 7:00pm. I have some business on that end of town. _

-

The bad thing about the pier is the openness of it all. There’s no cover and high visibility, excluding those rare days where the fog rolls in thick and heavy. His suit puts off an impressive amount of condensation even in the mid-fall weather; it rises around his head and tiny droplets stick to his goggles and freeze near-instantly. He grumbles and slides them onto his forehead, and stops mid-motion, hand still on his goggles, when he sees Bruce Wayne striding over.

“BW, Jesus I’m an idiot.” Who  _ else  _ has the kind of cash this guy’s been throwing around. “Getting bored of being rich, Wayne?”

“Victor, it’s great to see you!” Bruce beams, all energy and enthusiasm as he finishes striding over and clasps Victor’s hand in his. “You don’t need to worry about my wallet. I hardly notice your payments.”  _ I should be asking for more _ , Victor thinks. “I know what you’re thinking: why is Bruce Wayne paying me to do nothing?”

“That about covers it,” Victor says. “I’m getting the feeling you’re not going to explain why.”

“I’m afraid I can’t divulge my motivations just yet.” He’s smirking, cocksure and confident despite the absurdity of it all. “Why don’t you just trust me for now.”

“Pass,” he smirks right back.

Bruce isn’t phased. In fact his damn smile gets a bit bigger. “I like you,” he says, pointing emphatically. “I think this is going to work out great.”

“Uh huh,” he says curtly. Victor’s not exactly a patient person. “What is  _ this _ exactly?”

“Well,” Bruce starts, clasping his hands together, and then pointing at Victor without letting them separate, “I know you’re still working on that cure,” he says casually, and Victor tightens his grip on his weapon. Bruce isn’t phased, “and I can’t imagine you get a lot done when people keep hiring you for work.”

Victor feels his eyebrow twitch. “I get by.”

“No judgement,” Bruce laughs. “I didn’t mean to offend.” He clears his throat and has the decency to look apologetic underneath all the posturing. “I think my offer will make it up to you.”

“You in the market to throwing around free money?”

“Not quite,” he says, “but it’s close.”

“Close?”

“The next time you get a job offer I’d appreciate if you could send it my way, and whatever they offer I’ll double it.”

Victor studies Bruce’s sure smile and the way he’s just so certain about this strange suggestion of his. “That’s going to dry up my job prospects pretty damn fast.”

“In the short term, yes,” he agrees. “But let’s not worry about that now.” He claps a hand against the plating over Victor’s upper arm in a friendly gesture. “Take some time off, and don’t forget to send me those jobs!”


	3. Chapter 3

His next job is another annoyance from Bookworm, and the thought of having to deal with that guy and his long-winded monologues is enough to get him to send it off to Bruce Wayne and wash his hands of the whole ordeal.

And then there's Penguin, who demands this and that but doesn't deem the job worthy of his personal attention, hence his need for Victor's involvement. Also a no-brainer. Giving up a measly tip for double the offer is and will always be the better deal.

He doesn't even read Kiteman’s job he just sends it over.

And then suddenly it's been a month and he's gotten more work done than he has all last year.

At first it’s a relief.

At first.

The freedom Bruce’s attempting to provide Victor is foreign, and if he’s being honest with himself, kind of boring. Dry spells happen. People go to Arkham or Blackgate or hell, sometimes they really just want to bask in their own glory for a little. But four uninterrupted weeks in the lab makes him restless.

So the next time Two Face sends him a job offer he takes it. It’s a simple in and out; he’s after some rare coin collection at the same place Riddler just robbed last month. Same building, same exhibit room, same poor sap of a security guard that drew the short straw tonight. If this doesn’t inspire the guy to find work elsewhere nothing will.

“We’re looking for the rare double faced set,” Two Face says. Victor tips his head back a bit to try and turn his groan into some sort of inquiring grunt as he looks at the cameras. Iced over, just like last time. It’s kind of disappointing that they didn’t even try to improve the security between exhibits.

Until it’s obvious they  _ did _ , because one of Two Face’s henchmen sets off an alarm. Victor waits long enough to see that Two Face and their men’s strategy is something of a wild scramble, so he takes the hint and starts leaving through the side door he and Riddler used to dodge the main security room.

“Should have just stayed in the lab,” he berates himself. Behind him he hears the thunder of feet, and he turns, swears, then shoots off a giant blast of ice to separate himself from the trio of guards coming his way. One of them is caught in the ice and frozen on the spot, and it shocks his fellow guards enough to let Victor slip out into the alley and onto the rain-slick streets.

He doesn’t exactly blend in with the general public, but the museum is close enough to the subway to allow him to slip underground and find a storage closet to hole up in until the threat of capture passes. He moves around until he finds the corner with the best signal and sets his gun against the wall.

_ Got a belated one for you _ , Victor sends to Bruce.

_ I’m interested in your choice of adjective _ , he gets back.  _ Are you holding out on me? _

_ Some habits are hard to break _ , he says. He knows Bruce can’t see him but he shrugs one arm.  _ Two Face is after some defect set of rare coins. Offered me $20,000 to run point, or whatever they said. I'll be honest, I wasn't paying attention. _

He stops getting messages. Fair enough, he didn’t do what Bruce asked. The guy probably doesn’t take not getting his way all that well after twenty-odd years of getting to do what he wants.

It’s not like he’s getting his way either. Instead of getting back to his lab and getting out of his suit he’s stuck in this closet until the GCPD is finally over looking for him or any of Two Face’s men. The best he can do is settle against the wall and try to sleep sitting up for a couple hours until the heat’s off. (Ha.)

His phone buzzes in his hand, and he opens one eye to glower down at it for disturbing the closest thing to sleep he's going to manage tonight.

It's his pay app. Bruce still doubled Two Face’s payment.

“Guess late is better than never with this guy,” he mutters.

-

A steady stream of heavy knocks on his door sends some ice tinkling to the floor and rouses Victor from his lazy attempt to get some of the massive ice chunk chipped away from his ceiling and walls. He lifts his head from the cool surface and sets aside his tools on the top of his step ladder before descending and crossing the room to peer out at the person behind the disturbance.

“Shit,” he mutters. He opens the door for his chemical supplier and feigns a bit of friendliness for a guy he just can't seem to shake no matter how disinterested he acts. “Sal.”

“Got that helium you wanted,” he says, far too chipper and far too close. It actually stings a bit to have so much hot air blowing on his face. “And the uh,” he pauses to look down at his clipboard, “the reagent series. This stuff isn't good to go in the freezer.”

“Upper floor is room temp,” he says, modding up at the ceiling. “You know the drill.”

“I do, I do,” he says. He tries to clap Victor on the shoulder with his scorching hot paw, but Victor ducks back in time and scowls down at the offending limb. “You're looking like hell froze over today, Victor,” the guy laughs at his own joke. Victor doesn't. “What happened? You're usually so cheery.”

What he wouldn't give to find another chemical supplier in Gotham.

“Long day,” Victor says, “that turned into a long night.” He shrugs and backs up from the door to let Sal inside. “I'll live.”

Sal uses the powered hand cart to wheel in his new tank of helium and stops near the iced over mess he's made of the corner. “That one empty?” he asks, teeth chattering away in the cold.

Victor reaches over and opens up the canister, letting loose the last dregs of the helium. It sprays over his face as a pleasant mist, and he brushes off the helium shards as Sal sputters from the drop in temperature. “It is now.”

“Jesus, how about a little warning!”

To his credit he does look a little frostbitten from the blast of cold. He deadpans out a, “sorry,” and Sal is mollified. “Off-set the new one by about three feet. I need to finish chiseling.”

“I swear you must drink this stuff with how fast you go through it.” Sal chuckles to himself as he lowers the full canister to the floor.

“I do,” Victor says, and Sal wheezes. He doesn't. He could, at least in theory he could. He’s never bothered to test it but the math checks out. “I'll have another order for next month.”

“Of this?” he says through a grunt as he engages the hydraulics and raises the empty canister off the floor. “You really are drinking it?”

“Reagents. New experiment. I'll send you the request.”

“You know you can always just call,” Sal says, once again offering up one of his scalding hands in a friendly gesture Victor has no desire to return. “Compared to half this city you're one of my most amicable customers.”

Victor shakes his head. “I prefer to have physical records.”

“Suit yourself,” he says, and as Victor turns he doesn't catch Sal moving to clap his bare shoulder until it's already on fire from the skin to skin contact. Victor seethes through his teeth and ignores the other pleasantries thrown his way in favor of leaning up against the ice buildup until the sting recedes. By the time he's cooled off the spot Sal is already gone, and by the sounds of things he's dropping off the reagents upstairs.

He hates it, but he's going to have to enact a personal requirement of 'no shirt no shoes no service’ when Sal drops off his orders unless he wants some Sal sized hand prints burned into his skin. It's that or find another chemical supply, and that's just not happening in Gotham.

Victor pulls his phone from his pocket and sends a message off to Crane _ , your reagents are here _ , and then he's back to chipping at the ice.

He hardly makes any progress before Crane messages back,  _ how dreadful _ .

Victor grumbles as he sends his reply.  _ Will you just say if you're coming or not.  _ And then another.  _ I don't have to do this for you, you know. I could let you go back to stealing chemicals from the college. _

He angrily chips away at more of the ice, and then drags his phone back out to add another.  _ You're lucky I'm going to be in all day. _

And that's the message that gets him to reply _. I'm afraid I'm preoccupied with a ghastly experiment at the moment._

_ Fine _ . He really does not understand this aesthetic or die mentality.  _ Knock loud if you come over for your pickup.  _ He looks at the giant hunk of ice and is overcome with a desire to not do this anymore today. He sends a quick,  _ I'm crashing. _

_ Sounds grim. _

_ Stop texting me. _ For good measure he puts his notifications on silent as he walks to his bedroom. It takes a few tugs to get the sealed door to open, but the extra-chilled air inside hits him like a wave and he sighs.

He drops his phone on the little table by his bed without bothering to plug it in and pulls back the thin covers before just dropping face first onto the mattress without making it under the sheets.

-

When he wakes it's to the sound of aggressive pounding on has door. He lifts his head with a groan, but some frozen spit causes it to stick to his cheek. Victor swaits it off and rubs the ice shards off his face, and then he sits up and tilts his phone towards him to check for messages.

He has two, both from Crane, and both are just pictures of his door.

God, he can be such a creep.

Victor leaves the cool sanctuary of his private room and ambles over to the door. The knocking hasn't stopped, Crane's really throwing a good portion of his miniscule weight into the motion, so Victor yanks the door open in between two of the knocks and sends Crane stumbling inside, sidestepping just in time to avoid another handprint burn.

Crane straightens, dusting off his thick black parka as he does, until he's looking Victor dead in the eye. He's sans mask, plus a stocking hat holding down his wild hair, and thick framed glasses that make his glare lean towards the petulant end of the threat spectrum.

“You know, a disguise is usually better if you're not wearing your usual clothes.”

“I'm not wearing my mask,” he says. The usual low, gravelly tone he goes for loses something without the muffling from the mask.

“Parka’s not exactly a departure from that old coat you keep patching.” Or the dark leggings, or the boots, which are both clearly visible under the parka. “Good thing you have a baby face.”

Whatever threat he was trying to convey with his dark, brooding look doesn't really land. It's the lack of a mask, not that it bothers Victor even when it's on, but without it his vibe is definitely not the fearsome terror of Gotham. “Crane, it’s been years since you could intimidate me. You aren't threatening. You’re like the loner goth kid that sits in the back of the psych 101 lecture in college.” Crane does this growling, somewhat gurgly thing in the back of his throat as a last ditch effort. It’s really a lost cause. Somewhere along way they departed the path that led Victor to think of him as some well functioning terror of Gotham years ago. “You’re going to hurt your throat in this cold if you keep that up.”

“You're patronizing me,” Crane growls. “It's abominable.”

“Yep,” Victor says lightly, “but I get to because I'm your elder.” He keeps on scowling, which is again, not intimidating. But, like many of the other rogues, he's kind of fragile, so to placate him Victor ceases his observational teasing, and as a bonus he doesn't mention the cold induced tremor along Crane's jaw. “Your reagents are upstairs. Just send the payment through my app.”

“You’re coming,” he demands, but there’s a little warble in his voice from the cold. “I have something dreadful for you.”

Victor closes his eyes and, just for a few seconds, pretends he isn’t living inside a glorified walk in freezer, attempting to broker a chemical transaction from someone that likes to be called The Scarecrow in his free time. But the moment he opens his eyes the swirling cloud from Crane’s breath condenses between them and the daydream is lost.

“Dreadful doesn't sound very enticing. Did you mean dreadful?” Crane decides he's not going to be helpful, but the smirk is clear enough. “When is your birthday? Is it Halloween? It feels like that would be fitting.” The unexplained tangent throws Crane a bit, but Victor's on a roll so he keeps his momentum going. “I’m getting you a dictionary next Halloween. I'll even do some highlighting on words I think you should focus on. I'm guessing you'll get better results when you say what you mean.”

Crane blinks. “So you don't  _ want _ a job.”

“I don't know if I'd use that word, but I guess I'm intrigued.” Victor shakes his head. “You’re really going to make me suit up just to go listen to you talk?” Crane doesn’t even have the decency to nod; he just stares in that blank, vaguely threatening way of his. “If you have business just  _ text  _ it to me.”

“I don’t have my phone.”

The only way this could be a worse lie is if it was out in his hand. Time to call his bluff. Victor pulls his own phone from his pocket and calls Crane, staring at his pocket as the screen light manages to penetrate the layers of his parka. Crane refuses to concede and lets it keep buzzing until Victor just gives in and ends the call.

“Fine, just,” he sighs, “go upstairs and make sure all your stuff is there. And don’t mess with the rats,” he warns. “I’m setting up a new experiment and they need to acclimate.”

He doesn’t bother checking to make sure Crane leaves the lab before returning to his bedroom to pull on his suit. Either he sits around in the cold waiting for Victor, or he has the sense to go upstairs like Victor said. Jury’s still out on which one Victor thinks will happen today.

The lab is empty when he finally emerges, suited up but unarmed, and he follows the trail of wet footprints outside to the rusted metal staircase. Crane's left the door ajar, and Victor finds him crouched by the crate of various chemicals, parka discarded to his right and, as Victor feared, a black, patched up jacket that's shorter but still obviously part of Crane's general aesthetic.

“I'm going to highlight disguises too,” he says nonchalantly. There's a bit of a reverberation as his voice bounces around in the dome of his suit. Crane glances up at him, irritated, and turns back to his reagents. “In the dictionary.”

“I never went to college,” Crane says instead of acknowledging Victor's joke gift that's becoming more real by minute.

“That's what you're hung up on?” Another glance. Another tick up the scale of irritation. “That’s not true though.” Another look, but a sideways shift to confusion. “I know you had Penguin’s guy make you a functioning fake school ID to get your chemicals with a five finger discount.”

“Why.”

“Why do I know?” Crane’s eye twitches instead of giving any sort of helpful response. Close enough. “Penguin’s chatty, but you know, he  _ is  _ still scared if you. Have fun with that.”

“It will be harrowing,” Crane growls out. His face splits with a wild grin. Little bit creepy. “For  _ him _ .”

“I’m sure.”

That's all it takes to make him frown again. He must be touchy today. “You don't take me seriously.”

“Sure I do,” Victor says. Probably not very convincing, but hey, he's not really trying. “When the situation warrants it.”

“My work is serious.”

“Your  _ hobby _ isn't.” Crane clanks two volatile reagent bottles together, because he has almost no self preservation and probably thinks Victor's going to flinch. He doesn't. The suit isn't made of  _ paper _ . It'll protect him from a blast more than some ratty hoodie. “Don't  _ pout _ . For fuck’s sake you're nearly thirty. And don't pretend  _ you  _ take yourself seriously when you're doing the whole Scarecrow bit.”

“I do.”

Christ this fucking kid. “No you don't. It's a  _ hobby _ . You do it to have fun, or something. I don't have any hobbies. Probably why I never have fun.” Sort of a lie. Messing with the kid is kind of amusing. Sicking Crane on Penguin is too in an indirect sort of way. Probably not something he could call a hobby though. “If you really took your Scarecrow thing seriously you would have found a way to make it lucrative.”

The thing is, he's sure Crane gave it his best to  _ do  _ that. Guy went through the trouble to compile a spreadsheet to figure out just what his time is worth. If there was any way to make money scaring the piss out of Gothamites he would have found it already. Crane doesn't argue his side further, so one meaningless, hollow point for Victor.

“This for a job or is it a personal project?”

“Personal,” Crane says. He straightens, holding a 500 gram bottle in his hand. “I wanted two of these.”

“New restrictions. It's pretty unstable. You probably shouldn't wave it around too much.” Crane returns the bottle to its spot in the box with a bit too much disregard, but fuck it, it's only an oxidizer. He'll probably be fine. “Everything else there?”

“I’ll need that second bottle,” he says, “but I suppose I can make due.”

“Don't know how you're going through so much of that so fast anyway,” Victor mumbles. He doesn't really want to know, and Crane doesn't usually want to share. “So what's this job you have for me?”

Crane shoves his hands into his jacket pockets and pulls the sides closer to his torso. Might need to look at the temp up here. The rats aren't going to like shivering on a daily basis if too much cold is seeping up through the floor. “I have a few organic components that are rather unstable in room temp conditions. It’d be rather devastating to lose them and have to find suitable replacements.”

“Fine.” Kind of a waste to come all the way upstairs for  _ this _ , but it'll be a nice way to break up his schedule. “I'm not competing for your attention again, so make sure you're not going to get called away in the middle.”

“The Bat’s been an awful nuisance as of late.” Crane pulls his hands from his pockets, holding a beat up wallet in his left hand. He opens it and pulls out a wad of nasty, stained bills, some of which have creepy smiles doodled over the presidential portrait. He starts counting them while talking. “Valeska’s underground. Hatter's back in Arkham. Heard Two Face and him got into some horrid fight at the museum.”

“Two Face doesn't know how to do things without a fanfare.”

“He rounded up Bookworm and Kiteman before they even got inside the buildings.”

“I really can't stand those guys. Seriously, what happened to Gotham? When did everything get so ride or die?” Victor accepts the wad of bills without counting them. Crane's good for it, even if his money is nasty. “See, this is why I know you don't take it seriously, or you'd have come all dressed up. Take it as a compliment. I mostly mean it as one.”

“What about your aesthetic.”

“Mine is literally ride or die.” Unfortunately. He really does hate how necessary the suit is to keeping him alive outside his lab. “He got them outside the buildings?”

-

The next time he gets a job is a lie, but waiting for something to crop up organically stretches into a week long wait, and Victor doesn't have they kind of patience these days. He wants his theory proven  _ now _ .

So he fudges a claim, sends something about Scarecrow doing something or other in the Narrows, and he goes there in his suit but without his weapon, and he waits.

And ten, maybe twenty minutes after he sends the job a sleek, overly suped up black car pulls up in an alley and out steps the fucking Batman. He touches somewhere around his ear and says something, but Victor's on the roof of a five story building and can't hear what he's saying.

“God, fuck this city,” he sighs. He watches the guy climb up the rusted fire escape until he's a story away, and then he stands back with his arms crossed as much as he can in the suit. Batman pops up and Victor calls out to him. “Hey Wayne.”

Bruce or not-Bruce regards him coolly, unmoving, but then he pulls back the cowl and there he is, billionaire brat Bruce Wayne, aka the Batman, aka a very strong reason Victor is considering just walking out of the city with only his suit and never looking back.

“Victor,” Bruce nods. Something's more reigned in about him, more mature or at least less of a human disaster. Makes as much sense as anything else in this city. “I suppose your job offer was a ploy.”

“Oops,” he shrugs. “You can ask for the money back. I didn't really play fair.”

“You earned it,” Bruce says, grinning. He either finds this amusing or he's still acting the fool. “I guess you noticed my decreased response time,l and put two and two together.”

“Among other things.” Victor pushes up his goggles and studies Bruce's easy stance. He's been in this business long enough to recognize when someone is feigning being relaxed. Kid could go zero to sixty like  _ that _ . “It was more like, two plus the square root of two, or something like that.” He is a little pissed at himself for not thinking it earlier. “Crime fighting didn't really fit in with your playboy routine.”

“That's the idea,” Bruce says. “Alfred and I take great care to cultivate that image to keep this one out of the spotlight.”

“Probably smart.”

“I’m sorry if my methods made you feel used.” Didn't really until he said that but okay. “Lately Gotham's Rogues have gotten better at hiding their activities. I needed someone on the inside, someone familiar with their motives and hideouts.”

“Well’s kind of dried up now,” Victor says. “Half of them are in Arkham or Blackgate. Others wised up to the pattern.”

“I know. I expected this, but I'm willing to make you another offer.”

“Going to just pay me to stay out of the way?” He could go for that, actually. Maybe dabble with whatever the hell Crane's cooking up in they dingy basement of his to break up the days.

“No, Victor. I was thinking of asking you to join me.”


	4. Chapter 4

“What?” Victor blinks a few times. Tries to get his mind wrapped around whatever Bruce means by “joining him” and whether or not it's always been an elaborate ruse. Seems like a waste of money, but so does a lot of this whole fever dream. “Did you mean to say that?”

“Your services can be bought,” Bruce says, “so I don't see why I can't do the same.”

“My services,” he repeats. “You mean the part where I freeze people.”

“I mean the part where you have a means to end confrontations peacefully,” Bruce clarifies. Victor doesn't mention the shattered henchmen. It's mostly because of momentum. His  _ ice  _ isn't deadly on its own. “You're methods are generally non-lethal,” so he  _ does  _ know, “you're intelligent, and if that isn't enough to convince you, I've dried up your illegal options already by having you give me your job requests.”

“Kind of underhanded for a guy trying to stop crime.”

“There are a few reasons I don't work directly with the GCPD. Most significantly right now is the fact that you're a wanted criminal, and if they knew I was asking you to join me I don’t think they’d like it.”

Victor shrugs one shoulder. “I've been worse.”

Bruce actually laughs a little, but his too-serious resting vigilante face comes back right away. “I do hope you take my offer seriously, Victor. I think you could do lot of good for this city if you direct your energy to do so.”

“I'll think about it,” he says. He has a buffer, hasn't even touched his tips from Penguin yet. He can squeeze a few more months worth of research out of his funds, more if Crane's job request actually happens. Kid's fickle sometimes. “Probably won't have more work for you in the meantime.”

“Even if you don't the city will,” Bruce says. He sounds tired. “Take care of yourself, Victor.”

“I'll put some effort into it. Guess you should probably do the same.” He can't come up with a clever, shitty send-off to give Bruce, so he just shoves his goggles back down over his eyes and leaves.

-

“Can’t believe The Batman wants me to work for him. And it's that  _ rich brat _ ,” Victor huffs. He adjusts the angle of the injector above one of the many rat cages so it's centered. “Guess you probably don’t know him. You'd have to read some of the articles about him in the paper. I'll do some digging for you after this.”

The rat in the forth cage twitches its whiskers up at him, sniffing as he finishes adjusting the exposure apparatus. He taps on the canister and studies the way the liquid does a slow slosh until it settles. He's going to have to keep an eye out for clogging in the nozzles.

“You have it easy,” he tells the rat. “I did this to myself  _ and  _ tried to find the right formula. All you have to do is live.” Or freeze. He's fairly certain some of the rats will be removed from the trial after the first dose of cryoprotectant. “I know it's a lot to ask but don't try to eat the apparatus.”

He steps back to admire the hodge podge of cobbled together sprayers and the old canisters he used to attach to his freeze gun before he figured out a more efficient system. There’s a thirty, no, probably a forty percent chance this won’t work at all. Worst case scenario he makes a dozen rat ice cubes and has to scrap the experiment so they can thaw out.

Or maybe diluting the formula screwed with it enough to bring back the whole deal where thawing led to liquification. Now  _ that’s  _ a worst case scenario. Nothing derails an experiment like losing all the test subjects day one.

He really hopes that doesn't happen. His available funds won't last long if he's constantly replacing the rats.

But at some point he just has to say, “fuck it,” and he pulls the stop valve to let the canisters release a three second spray onto the cages below. The first five are still scurrying around their cages, pissed off now that they're cold and wet, but the rest are stuck in place.

“Rats above a thirty percent dilution all froze solid,” he says into a small recorder built into his suit’s right arm. “No signs of cracking or other damage. I'll monitor them until thawing is complete.”

He’s not planning on unpacking the associated emotional response he's having that's causing his hands to shake. He  _ gets  _ it, but he's never felt that inclined towards self reflection, and anyways, he could just be hungry. It's hard to get motivated to eat when everything safe to eat is somewhere between tasteless and chalky.

One by one the higher percentage rats begin thawing out. They're clumsy, but they go straight to cleaning their fur of the droplets left behind, and following that they behave normally. Pissed, but still normal.

“No outside signs of damage from the freeze,” he says into his arm. “Look, I get that it feels weird,” he says to the rats, “but hey, a lot of people would love to only work three seconds out of the day.” He starts grabbing the cages of rats that froze and one by one he sets them on a separate table, then he starts dismantling the apparatuses that were above their cages.

When he's finished he records one last note. “Rats that received too high a dose won't continue the trial. I'll reserve them for replication purposes in case this Hail Mary experiment starts actually working.”

-

“Day,” he pauses and stares down at rat Four. “I really wish you guys could keep track of this for me.”

It's been a week. Or maybe it's been two weeks. He loses track a lot now that he hardly leaves his lab. He fills the rat feeders and does some more menial maintenance on the cages before returning to his lab so he can be free of his suit.

Half his days end up being a mix of lounging and dull, monotonous responsible adult chores. It's uncomfortably domestic. He's going to end up going stir crazy if he doesn't get a real hobby, like- Jesus he can't believe this- like Crane.

He never did call Victor back about those specimens he supposedly needs help with. It's not that out of character. Guy probably got busy with whatever spooky nonsense he's up to these days (or whoever he's decided is worthy of having his attention), and when he remembers the experiment he'll show up unannounced with some deranged looking sample from an “unknown” source.

Or at least that's what he's done this time. Crane doesn't bother texting or calling, he just shows up with a cooler in his hand and, surprise surprise, one of his masks over his face.

“Please tell me that's not a human head.”

“It isn't human,” is the response he somehow deems appropriate. There's a crinkle by one of his eyes that either indicates he's only saying it for kicks or he's  _ that  _ amused by having some sort of animal head in his cooler.

“Great,” Victor sighs. “Just bring it in, whatever it is.” Fifty/fifty shot it's genuinely some sort of animal. “Put it on my bench,” he gestures, and he takes a few seconds to pull on a pair of gloves and some safety glasses.

He opens the cooler and, thank fuck, only finds several vials of a yellowish fluid. Crane hovers over his right shoulder as he carefully removes the samples and sets them on the lab bench.

“So are we just looking at these or,” Crane interrupts by shoving a handwritten procedure under his nose, “oh.” Victor takes it and starts skimming the steps, of which there are only five. “This is it?”

“It's the only cold sensitive portion of my experiment,” he says. “I'd be fearful of wasting any of my components because you're being careless.”

Victor just lets Crane's attitude roll over him for a bit. He's Off, capital “o”, but he always is, just not always the same way. “So you're in a mood I guess.”

“An acquaintance of ours regrets being a bit too open about my affairs.”

“Ah,” Victor nods. “Just got done terrorizing Penguin, huh?”

“And following such an awful success I'm looking for another. I plan to observe your work.”

Victor's leaning towards telling him no, or to at least get out of the lab instead of fretting over this mystery liquid he's brought over. Crane's not wearing his parka, and he's got to be putting a lot of effort into not shivering, or he's already wrapped all the way around to being too cold to shiver. That could be an issue.

“You're really going to watch me add,” he glances at the procedure another time and shakes his head, “a stabilizer? You do know it only takes ten minutes to do this.”

“Times the number of vials,” Crane interjects.

“Which I can do concurrently,” Victor sighs. “If you're going to wait here just do it upstairs.”

The defiant shithead pulls up a stool and sits down with a sharp hiss when the ice cold metal hits the back of his poorly insulated legs. He crosses his arms, an attempt to be intimidating but it's definitely more to help keep what little body heat he has left from leaving. Victor can see his lower lip trembling through the uneven stitches of the mask’s mouth.

“Whatever,” he mumbles, and he starts setting up.

The natural (or possibly unnatural) high Crane is riding after scaring the proverbial (or literal) piss out of Penguin doesn't do anything to mask his perception of temperature. Victor's only three test tubes in to adding the stabilizing chemicals when Crane rockets off the stool and starts struggling with the door to his lab.

Struggling really is the right word, because after Victor finishes another tube Crane still hasn't managed to break the seal and free himself. Victor sighs tiredly and sets aside his pipette and safety glasses before walking over and opening the door with little difficulty. Crane glares back at him, and Victor sends him off with a little wave.

“Door's unlocked,” he says lightly. Crane doesn't answer, but he stomps upstairs and slams the door to the upper lab, so Victor returns to his lab bench to finish the job.

It's for the best; the kid's self preservation is at an all time low after a “kill”, or whatever he calls his victories. And it's not like Victor needs any sort of help. Crane's work is menial and boring, but he'll pay for Victor's time and the use of his reagents and really, it's nice to break up his schedule a bit even if all he's doing is pipetting some liquids into another liquid.

Secretly, there's an itty bitty part of him that worries for this adult sized teenager's general well being, even if it's only because the occasional mutual heckling and quiet shared spaces is the closest thing to companionship that he can stomach. It’s be a shame if he let the kid freeze to death because his apathy couldn't overcome Crane's stubbornness.

He makes quick work of the stabilization, and while the tubes are still gently mixing in his test tube shaker he suits up to go share the good news with Crane, and maybe also with the intent of making sure he's not doing anything reprehensible in Victor's upper lab space after he couldn't take the cold. He doesn't need a working occasional partnership to die because Crane's gotten himself worked up into a frenzy over not being able to sit in a freezer for an hour without any sort of cold protection. Victor can't even  _ leave  _ without something to keep him cool, and he's prepared to wax poetic about his predicament if it'll make the kid think Victor's the real weenie for not being able to survive at ambient room temp.

It ends up not being necessary, because Crane's found his own way to chill in the form of letting one of Victor's disqualified rats run across his hands in a slow march. He's mumbling something down at the rat, though Victor can't hear and he's making an effort to keep it that way, so he stops walking.

“They're not that used to people,” Victor says to a guy who probably relates given his tense startle, but he doesn't drop the rat and doesn't turn around. “I can't really do that,” he says, indicating Crane's bare hands touching tiny little hot pokers masquerading as rat feet. “Suit doesn't have the dexterity in the gloves.”

He doesn't even bother to acknowledge Victor's presence let alone reply to his inane musings. He just keeps acting like an oversized treadmill for rat Seven. “Your mystery liquid is almost done. Just needs to finish agitating.”

“It's concentrated cortisol,” Crane says. He turns around and switches treadmilling for just holding the rat against his grimy sweatshirt. The rat’s busy trying to find a way inside. “It's not terribly stable in this form, hence the temperature requirement to perform stabilization.”

“Ah,” Victor nods. “So you're doing the whole conquering fear thing again. Got some new ideas?”

“I can't pay you,” he says instead of answering.

Victor feels his eyebrow twitch. “That’s usually something you mention  _ before  _ I do the work.”

“Valeska's requested a double batch this time,” he explains. “He has something ghastly planned.” The guy shouldn't be able to cuddle Victor's rat and talk about deadly Joker venom, but that's just the kind of world Victor's willfully allowed himself to integrate into. “I'll need to purchase more chemicals for his order.”

“So you're going to make me order stuff for you  _ and  _ you're not paying me.”

It's more a slippery slope than an actual drag on his resources. Victor's still riding Bruce Wayne's wave of cash and will for a few months, but if he gives Crane even an  _ inch _ the guy's going to start asking for favors left and right, and he really can't afford to be fast and loose with his reagents if he doesn't have steady income.

Crane shakes his head. “Not until Valeska pays me.”

“ _ If  _ he pays you,” Victor sighs. “I don't see why you accept his jobs.  _ I  _ don't accept his jobs, and I accept everyone’s jobs.”

“Our areas of interest tend to overlap-”

“No they don't.”

Crane glares at him, but even with the mask the presence of a rat trying to snuggle up in his coat pocket is ruining his frightening facade. “Because it's a job,” he snaps. “A horrible, dreadful job. Really frightful working for such an unpredictable fellow.”

“But it's still a job,” Victor finishes for him, mostly to stop the dual meaning filled rant from getting too long-winded. He suddenly has a meeting he needs to set up and go to. “Look, I have somewhere I have to be. Lock up when you're done playing with my rats.”

-

There's something to be said about how monumentally stupid he's being by borrowing the GCPD Bat Signal to get Bruce Wayne to come talk to him, but the asshole won't answer his cell phone and strolling up to Wayne Manor as is sounds about as stupid as this, so he flips the massive switch and sits back in the shadows in case Gordon notices his light is on without his say so.

He must've been on patrol, because the dark shape of The Batman ascends a nearby building and swings over with the help of a nearby structure and some fancy gadgets. He lands in front of the light, but seeing Victor emerge with his hands up makes him stumble over his cool greeting. “Wha-oh, Victor.” He drops the greeting fake voice and approaches as Victor switches the signal off. “This is unexpected.”

“Figured I shouldn't make this a house call,” he says.

“Does this mean you've finished thinking about my offer?”

“I might have had an epiphany,” he says. Staring down the barrel of eventual bankruptcy will do that. “I'm not going to swing from any rooftops.”

“I don't expect you to,” Bruce says, without any sort of laughter or amusement. It feels like a missed opportunity. “And I don't expect to need you on my daily patrol. I'm only interested in your services for dealing with Gotham's unique set of individuals that don't like doing things quietly.”

“You're really planning on nuking my alternative options with this plan of yours.”

“If I'm being honest with you Victor, I really shouldn't be soliciting-” he doesn't know why this phrasing feels bad but it absolutely does- “a known criminal instead of turning him into the authorities, which if I'm not mistake we are directly above, and you're unarmed.”

Victor mulls that one over a bit. “Fair, I guess.”

“You aren't like most of the Rogues, Victor. You've willfully continued to break the law, though you're conscious of your actions and why they're criminal. You've done a great deal of hurt in this city, but I don't think you're beyond redemption.”

“I'm flattered,” he deadpans, but also sort of means it at the same time. Just a little bit. It's not like he's gunning for validation from this punk, but Nora would have liked to hear that he's not rotten all the way through, just part way. “I'm guessing in your mind it's this or Arkham.”

“They are equipped to deal with your temperature related needs if nothing else,” Bruce says with little touch of bitter under the calm. “I do have one question.”

“Shoot.”

“Pretend money is no object, or, perhaps you have found gainful employment despite your unique needs. Perhaps the president pardons you, what then?”

“What then?”

“If, given the chance to redo your life without the threat of incarceration, what would you do?”

Victor looks down at his suit and scuffs one boot against the loose gravel scattered across the roof. “Probably not still need this.”

“You would do research.”

“I would  _ fix  _ myself,” Victor asserts.

“I'm sure that's easier when you don't need to run from law enforcement, legitimate or otherwise.”

“So why not just pay me to be good?” Victor asks. “I could probably manage that.” He has a feeling Bruce's response to any casual references to himself as anyone's sugar baby wouldn't be as good as Penguin's, but the opportunity is still tempting. “Pretty sure you've been accused of being some arm candy’s sugar daddy before.”

He neglected to remember the cowl, and Bruce's smirk could be confused bemusement, but there's no way to tell. “I'm afraid I can't justify that. I may be a vigilante but I do have a set of morals I vow to follow. Offering to let you work with me is already a concession on my part.”

“Fair,” Victor nods. “Do you want this in writing or something?”

“No, I think I prefer the honor system,”  he says. “I'll call you if I need your assistance.”


	5. Chapter 5

_Look, I'm not mad you took a rat._ He is, but only in a betrayed trust sort of way and not the loss of his test subject. _I'm just asking you to admit you took it._

 _Can't imagine the terror of having someone break into your lab_.

Victor squeezes the sides of his phone until the case starts to creak. _Don't act like I can't just walk over and see if you took it._ Scratch the 'if’ he definitely did. _If I had windows I could see your place from mine._

_You detest leaving._

_I detest this exchange_ , he snaps back. Part of him wishes this was happening in person so he could shake some sense into Crane's thick skull. The other part of him is just bitter Bruce called him an hour ago to confirm their first meeting with the good Commissioner himself. _I'm going out anyway. Suit’s already on._ Half on, which doesn't lend for mobility when the arms try to drag him back. _I can stop over. I have plenty of time._

He tosses his phone aside to finish getting ready, glaring down at it until the screen lights up with a simple response, _I prefer to think of Pestis as liberated from your horrifically cold experimentation._

 _Was that really that hard to admit?_ He pulls his suit on the rest of the way and pulls his goggles on, leaving the lenses up against his forehead. _So you renamed Seven Pestis._

_Seven is a number._

_It can be a name._ Victor takes longer than he's willing to admit to decide he should leave his freeze gun, and he sneaks a few freeze grenades into the compartments of his suit as a precaution. Nothing cools off an argument like temporarily freezing everyone involved.

_It's in reference to the bubonic plague._

Of course it is. He rolls his eyes even as he feels himself to typing out a correction. Sometimes he really does hate himself, or at least the company he keeps. _That was fleas, not rats._

God help him for continuing to argue with this guy.

_I'm aware of our miniscule horror. It's in reference to the species nomenclature._

Can't argue with that. Victor stashes his phone in its pocket and does one last systems check for his suit so he doesn't drop dead the minute he leaves his lab, and then he's making his way to a conspicuously parked _Batmobile_ at the end of the alley. Subtlety isn't really a _thing_ in Gotham. Good to know it's more widespread than Victor thought. Real encouraging.

And he just gets in the car, no hesitation or demands for privacy, because if he's honest the Batman is the only person in this God forsaken city that still poses a real challenge, and for now he's on Victor's side. Or Victor's on his side. Victor is being _paid_ to be on his side.

Not that the other Rogues are going to care about semantics when he starts ruining their day.

“How well can you climb a fire escape in your suit?”

Sometimes he can feel the start of at least five tendrils of wordplay spreading from a single comment, (fire escape, he's cold, there's got to be _something_ there) but none of them find purchase in time to snap back. He's going to have this percolating in his head all night. It'll keep him entertained.

“Victor?”

“It's not really designed for that-” wrong. Bad. There's not even wordplay it's just stating a _fact_ \- “I'm guessing you don't expect a warm welcome if we use the front door.”

“We're meeting on the roof.” Bruce points to the narrow, rusty escape on the side of the building near where they parked. “I'll be honest, I don't actually use it properly. It provides a few key foot and hand holds but the stair system is too slow for my tastes.”

“You prefer things fast,” he says.

“I do.” Maybe if Victor offers to take a pay cut he can convince Bruce to actually react to his humor. The faux innocent blinks don't really have the satisfaction of a good old Crane grumble or Penguin's squawking. “We'll have to make due with the back stairwell, though it may be in use.”

“That should be fun.” Part of him welcomes the conflict, the excitement, the chance to declare it self defense when they make an ice cube out of one of Gordon's people, so of course there's no one using the stairs. Victor blames the elevator. He eyes it suspiciously as they pass it on the top floor and continue down the hall towards roof access. “Anything I need to know?”

“Yes, a few things. There's no emergency tonight, but I wanted to discuss a few things with Commissioner Gordon, also I didn't warn him you'll be joining us. Sometimes he gets ahead of himself and I didn’t want him seeing it as an opportunity to override my plans to essentially leave you as a free agent.”

“Sure, wait what?” Bruce pushes the door to roof access open and his cape flows back in Victor's face. “What?”

“Try to be civil,” he says over his shoulder in his faked, gravel tumbling through a series of pipes voice. He ignores any and all non-verbal attempts to be reasoned with (because Victor's mouth is hanging open and doesn't seem to want to shut let alone form coherent words) and he turns to the lone figure on the roof. “Nights like this are rare, Commissioner.”

“Makes me nervous,” Gordon mutters under his breath. “Like there's,” and he just trails off into nothing. If there'd been coffee in his mouth he would have sprayed it all over the roof. Victor kind of wishes he had, because between his fight or flight expression and Bruce's lack of _any_ warning this is not looking good. And Victor's got, what, the ability to look unaffected whole his core is… slightly more affected? Maybe _very_ affected? Maybe he's considering using one of the grenades and just calling it a night? Crane could use some harassment over the whole rat thing-

“I've invited Victor to this meeting,” Bruce rasps. If he’s going to kill his voice talking like that he could do Victor a solid and actually _explain_ this stupid plan of his.

“Uh huh,” Gordon side-eyes Victor and he sends the Commish a little friendly wave. “I’m guessing this isn’t because you’re planning to turn yourself in?”

“Not really.”

“I’ve made him an offer,” Bruce steps in, and between them, probably on purpose. “I think Victor has valuable information and insight on the other Rogues here in Gotham due to his previous employment style.”

“This isn't anything he can't offer us from a cell?” Gordon asks with some sass behind his inquiry. Victor shrugs one arm in a non-answer. “Right.”

“I know you would prefer to see him in a cell-”

“Do you?” Gordon snaps. He has a vein popping out near his temple. “Because from here it doesn’t look like you do.”

“I came here because you deserve fair warning,” Bruce rasps out. Really he should just take up smoking and he wouldn’t have to put so much effort into the voice. “We’ve come here extending an olive branch. Victor’s come unarmed.”

“I’m not unarmed,” he deadpans. When Bruce turns to him and Gordon’s itchy trigger finger reaches for a side piece that doesn’t really go with his three piece suit Victor raises his arms up, wagging his fingers a bit. “Got two of ‘em,” he says do dispel the tension. He’ll take two dirty looks, and because they’re both assuming he’s just being a shithead Gordon doesn’t bother to ask about any _other_ weapons Victor’s known to carry.

“I don’t like this,” Gordon says under his breath. “I _told_ you I could send in officers as backup. We’re on the same side.”

“Unfortunately this isn’t a negotiation,” Bruce says. “I’ve asked Victor and you here tonight as a courtesy. Ultimately who I decide to include in my work is my choice, considering the simple fact that I don’t actually work for you, Commissioner.”

Gordon shakes his head and shoves up his old man glasses up onto his forehead to rub at his eyes. “This is what I get for condoning your actions.” He straightens up and feigns civility. Or maybe he’s just too tired to argue with a guy dressed like a giant flying mammal. “Let’s move to my office. There are a few tips I’ve gotten that I think you’ll want to look into.”

“Gordon,” Victor calls out, and he motions him over with one finger. Bruce hesitates behind Gordon, but Victor waves him off and he enters the door to the roof access stairs. “You’re a dad, so I think you can help me.” He’s rather proud of just how _horrified_ Gordon gets at the unspoken implication there. “There’s something funny about me using a fire escape, right? Kind of a polar opposite sort of thing.”

“I-” Gordon sputters out and sighs deep. “Are you asking me to help you with a joke?”

“This is what you signed up for.”

“I really didn’t,” he sighs. “I, sure, I guess there’s something there. I don’t know. Can we actually get to work if that’s why you’re really here?”

“Sure.”

Gordon keeps muttering about ‘ulcers’ and ‘letting Halloween fanatics fight crime’ and Victor snorts out a breath of laughter. Forget Penguin, _this_ guy is going to offer up plenty of entertainment.

-

Sun filters in through the east facing windows. He's never liked being greeted by a bright, blinding light, but Nora does, and the way it shines off her hair makes the edges feel soft, like the light’s from her and not the bright ball of fire in the sky peeking up behind her. She’s smiling. He loves that smile.

She watches him sleep. He knows this because she tells him every morning that he’s been snoring, that she finds the quiet whistle cute and not a bother. And she touches his cheek, feather light and soft as it runs against his stubble.

He reaches out a hand. There’s a curl in front of her face, criss-crossing like an angry crack across the surface of her skin-cold, ice spreading up only to shatter-the sunlight is harsh, stings his eyes-he touches one finger against her cheek and it cracks, falling in like she’s hollow, skin made of too-thin porcelain.

And he sucks in a breath, arm still outstretched but lying against the bed. He doesn’t try to move, all too familiar with the lingering sleep paralysis he’s gotten to know so well over the years.

It’s the only time he feels cold.

“Not really a great start to the day,” he tells the air after the chill recedes and he feels confident his arm will respond to signals to move, which he proves to himself by bringing it closer to his chest. Behind him on the nightstand his phone vibrates twice. Might be the reason he woke up, might just be the second of many things to go bad today.

No part of him wants to check the message. At best, _at best,_  it's some excuse from Crane as he tries to worm his way back inside Victor's lab so he can take another rat. At worst Bruce is sending him an offer for a _job_ , which wouldn't be so bad but he's going to be in a funk all day now. He can't put up with himself _and_ one of Gotham's worst. It's too much.

But, and this isn't new information or anything he knows this about himself, he won't get anything done in the lab if he screens Bruce's texts. Honestly it's taking too much effort to even consider swinging his arm back to get his phone let alone muster the will to actually _do_ something of substance.

He rolls onto his back and gropes for his phone, and when he knocks it off the nightstand he just lies there for a moment and considers never getting out of bed again.

It vibrates from the floor, and he takes pity on the object and reaches down, fumbling until he finds the cord and then follows the line until he closes his hand around the actual phone. He's been a pretty popular guy overnight, four messages is a lot for him when he only has one client (two if he counts Crane), and only one of them is a vague picture of some amalgamation of metal cages and various PVC piping, probably Pestis’ new digs. A literal pet project is probably good for the kid. Gives him something to tinker with that isn't some level of biohazard.

 _I have an offer_ , he sends Crane. _If you come run my experiment upstairs I'll look the other way if you decide to take another one of the standby rats._

He doesn't get any sort of reply, but Crane’ll do it. He owes Victor for the I.O.U. crap he pulled over the stabilizer.

Bruce sent the other three. It's one job for this afternoon, which Victor discovers is _now,_ another bad sign for the day. He scrolls up to two separate walls of text and swipes back down fast, mentally declaring the explanation too long to bother reading. The last text is a location and time, and a short comment, _the choice is yours_.

It's really _not_. Or, it is, but the options are work with him or hide in his lab like a recluse until he's arrested by The Batman himself, which isn't all that appealing. He sends a short reply, _I'll be there_ , and rolls until he's forced to accept gravity's cruel embrace as it drags him to the floor or bumble into a standing position.

He ends up with the former.

-

They meet on a roof near the Narrows, because Bruce hasn't deigned him worthy of seeing the Batcave just yet. It's for the best. He's not sure he's ready to be confronted with considering the minutiae of a grown man's crime fighting lair-nope, full stop. He can handle the broad strokes but he's going to have to go have a nervous breakdown in an alley if he tries to paint a clearer picture in his head. He had a hard enough time just driving his beat up van over here. He actually considered making Crane come over to drive him, which is horrifying on a couple counts, but mostly because he's fairly certain the kid can't drive.

He really should have called in sick. Taken a mental health day. Something. Instead he pulls down his goggles and opens the door to the roof access of a derelict apartment building, where he finds Bruce in his full uniform (costume, it's a damn costume) and brooding.

“You're a little old to be sulking,” is what he wants to say, but he scuffs some rocks on the roof with one heavy boot and Bruce snaps around so fast he about unleashes the Batarang from his hand straight at Victor's head. He doesn't, but the shot of adrenaline running up Victor's back brings an unnatural chill with it. “Hi.”

Bruce lowers his weapon and gives Victor a once over, cool as a cucumber and not really looking all that apologetic about his near homicide. “You're here,” he says. Not really a greeting. “There's been an escape from Blackgate.”

“Didn't you already tell me that in the message,” Victor shoots back, and his voice doesn't _warble_. He's just… in shock. Okay it did warble a little.

“No?” Bruce tips his head to one side. “I haven't confirmed the security or lack thereof of your private line.”

“Ah.” Victor nods. “This is the part where I admit to you that I didn't read your first two messages.”

“And you still came,” Bruce says, laughing under his breath. “I could have explained how I planned to turn you in.”

“Maybe that's how you'll get me,” Victor says with a shrug.

Bruce shakes his head, but he's chuckling, amused. “I'll work on shortening my messages.” Whatever faux or genuine civility fades and Bruce puts his serious face on. “Kiteman wasn't in his cell during the final head count yesterday. The Commissioner has asked that we look into his escape.”

“Kiteman?” Victor raises a brow. “ _Kiteman_ escaped from Blackgate.”

“It seems so.”

“Just him? Kind of hard to believe.”

“All other inmates were accounted for last night and this morning.” Bruce cringes and yet he still suggests, “I imagine he used a _kite_ of some sort. It is in his M.O. and the sheets in his cell were missing.”

“I really hate this city sometimes,” Victor mutters.

“I was hoping you had a few ideas as to where he might be hiding.”

“I've got a few,” Victor sighs. He steps closer to the building edge and rests the toe of his boot against the waist high brick retaining wall around the roof perimeter. “Guy has a kid.”

“I'm aware,” Bruce says as he steps to Victor's left. He taps Victor's arm, and when he looks away from the crumbling neighborhood he finds Bruce lifting his cowl.

“That doesn't seem very secure,” but he follows suit when Bruce tips his chin up and slides his goggles up onto his forehead. “Are we having a moment?”

“You've been listless tonight,” he says, “and you look unwell.”

“I don't get sick.”

“Then you look tired.”

Victor looks away and focuses on a bent up street sign. Wonder what hit it to get such a nasty angle that high up on the pole. When he looks back Bruce is still staring at him, unblinki-ah, nevermind. Maybe this isn't intimidation. Kid's just bad at being soft. “You have nightmares,” he starts, catches Bruce off guard, “about your parents.”

“Yes.”

He blinks. Big tough guy like Bruce didn't strike him as someone that would be that quick to admit he's human. Now he feels obligated to be _candid_ since Bruce didn't brush him off with a simple ‘of course not’, so he can't just say ‘yeah, me either’. “Well, you aren't the only one.”

“You can leave if you'd like,” he says. Victor takes in the sleek profile of the cowl and Bruce's jaw, and the way he's worrying his lip between his teeth. “I'm not going to hold it against you if you do.”

“Nah,” Victor waves him off. “I’m terrible at self pity.”

God he does not want Bruce to call him out on that please for the love of-

“We better get started then,” Bruce says. “You can't get sick?”

Victor snorts. “What the hell do you think can survive in my body long enough to do anything?”

“Fair.”

“You should know,” he calls after Bruce as they start for the stairs, “if he's in the sky I can just,” he imitates the sound of his freeze gun, “ice him over and we let gravity handle the rest. It would get rid of our Kiteman problem!” He shouts over Bruce's laughter. “You're not going to let me do that are you.”

“We're going to bring him back to Blackgate,” Bruce says. “You aren't the only one that deserves a chance to rehabilitate.”

“I'm not even doing it right. You're paying me to be good,” Victor reminds him. “I wouldn't be out here if you weren't paying my bills.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Editing's at an all time low because I have a cold but feels good to knock out another chapter, so here you go.

Word gets around fast in Gotham, particularly if it's damning or embarrassing. The Rogues are especially notorious for their gossip web and are, quite honestly, about as reliable at keeping secrets as a gaggle of high school girls. It's nobody's fault. There isn't a reputable source of news that dedicates all the necessary time and resources on the petty goings on among them, so a far reaching group of nattering busybodies is the next best thing.

Which is why a text from Penguin about a job is throwing up so many red flags in Victor's head. ( _I need a simple moving job within my empire completed this evening._  As if the phrasing is at all comforting.) The _second_ Kiteman landed back in Blackgate he would have spread the word about Victor's involvement in his arrest. (He got to freeze his mouth shut and, honestly, it was worth more to him than the money Bruce sent to his account.) Some of the less informed Rogues may send a job or two his way without knowing he's a kept man, but Penguin's empire is built on gossip, guns, and hair gel. He _has_ to know about Victor's arrangement with The Batman.

Hell, even _Crane_ is giving him the cold shoulder. Kid took a damn _mile_ when offered an inch and he won't even let Victor goad him about taking two rats instead of the offered one. As if Victor's going to go above and beyond with his arrangement and start rounding up the other Rogues without money lining his pocket. Unless Crane starts doing visibly shady shit and Bruce takes notice Victor has no intention of losing the opportunity to make some cash on the side.

 _Look I know_ _you're butthurt about my new job_ \- and he deletes the message. Crane is butthurt but he's also sort of justified. He knows Victor could throw something from his roof onto Crane's, so waltzing over to arrest him is feasible, at least from his perspective. _So you're not going to even tell me whatever nerdy names you gave them?_

_Fuck. Off._

_Those aren't very scientific._ He can picture the expression on Crane’s face. If only he could see in person. _See I implied those were the names._ Nothing. Terrible audience tonight. _You don't have to keep freezing me out. If had any intention to turn you over to The Batman I would have done it already._

Victor pockets his phone and returns his attention to his remaining rat subjects to administer the daily dose of cryoprotectant. Another reason to not turn Crane in? He did the experiment for Victor without any complaining _and_ he wrote down his observations. Competent experiment sitters are worth more than a one time payment.

He's halfway out of his suit back in the lab when his phone chimes in his suit pocket. Victor lets the suit drop to the ground and rummages through the pockets until he finds his phone. The screen flashes _Klebsiella and Aureus_ , and he shakes his head.

_More deadly diseases?_

_Deadly bacteria,_  Crane corrects him _. Musophobia is an easily exploitable fear due to the ease of finding specimens required to elicit a reaction._

_You mean steal._

_I prefer liberate, as I've said before._

He’s going to shove this kid's semantics down his throat one of these days. _You got over my new source of income fast._

_I know where you live._

Victor rolls his eyes and tosses his phone onto a nearby lab bench. He'll let Crane think he's being intimidated by a text message. He has bigger things to consider than his neighbor being mad at him.

The options aren't Penguin knowing or not knowing, they're something more like he definitely knows but is this a loophole he's found or a trap? He actually finds himself wishing Penguin had just called like he always does, because then Victor could have sussed out more information from his tone.

And that's probably why he didn't call, the bastard.

He isn't itching for a fight but he's itching for _something_ , and while Victor doesn't know if walking into Penguin's trap will give him that elusive whatever he does know standing around in his lab, waiting for his experiment to work or fail, won't do the trick.

Victor looks down at his suit and sighs. “What's the chance Penguin's covering up a cry for help?”

Almost zero, but Victor still pulls on his suit and messages him back, _money hits my account and I'll be there._

-

He should have called Crane and told him he can have all the rats if Victor winds up dead in a gutter somewhere.

He didn't, and really he knows the kid would claim he saw Victor's body in the Narrows or something as an excuse to steal the rest of his rats, but driving up to Penguin's club and walking in with one freeze gun and about fifty percent of his will to live doesn't make him feel like the outcome of this encounter will go in his favor. It's the fake ice all over the club. It lures him right into a comfortable false sense of security, like one blown suit gasket won't matter when ice can survive.

Penguin meets him at the door, which isn't unusual because he's an impatient little twerp but his mirthless grin isn't exactly comforting.

“So nice of you to make room for me in your busy schedule,” Penguin, in true slimeball form, oozes out a fake compliment and holds the door, so Victor's definitely dying tonight. It's fine. He's made peace with the loss of his semi-mortal existence.

Feels like a douchebag sort of thing to consider himself semi-mortal. He keeps the comment to himself. Penguin would find a way to use it to ridicule him.

“You paid me to be here,” Victor says. He starts to walk towards the bar but a literal pile of boxes in the center of the room makes him pause. “Oh, you’re moving.”

Penguin cocks his hip and leans more on his cane and taps a finger against his closed lips. “I think you’ve gotten a little lax with your standards, Victor. The Batman?” His voice reaches a new pitch previously only heard by dogs. “Really?”

“You know, I’d still go to whoever pays the most,” Victor counters, but Penguin waves him off, chuckling mirthlessly as he rummages around for something behind the bar. “I can freeze you before you shoot me, you know.”

“Oh, Victor,” he sighs, “I’m not going to shoot you,” and then he grabs the nearest beer stein and hurls it Vicor’s way, though his rage throws his aim off, and the stein develops a wicked curve towards the smattering of tables across the room. The handle breaks off during impact and maybe it also cracks the tile, but at least it wasn't his face. “Then I can’t _savor_ enacting the precise retaliation I’ve cooked up ever since your greed resulted in _multiple lieutenants in my empire_ being arrested.”

“So you’re pretty pissed,” Victor deadpans. He sidesteps just a hair closer to the stack of boxes, betting the contents inside are worth enough to keep him from hurtling more glassware.

“The, the _gall_ , Victor really, I know your loyalty isn’t worth five cents in this city but _The Batman_? There’s loyalty, and then there’s _standards_ , Victor-”

“Are you saying this applies to people like _Kiteman_ or just you?”

“I am- just-!” Penguin snarls and rounds the bar in an angry huff, and he slams a bottle of vodka on the counter. “And just how much does a man of your _elevated moral standing_ charge to make a decent martini?”

“I’m not that kind of chemist,” Victor says. “You’re better off just drinking straight out of the bottle.”

“Oh, I plan to,” Penguin sighs and unscrews the lid and swirls the bottle like it’s a wine glass, “but I’m going to pace myself. I’m not done berating you just yet.”

“I’d hate for your yelling to become incoherent,” Victor says. He crosses the room when Penguin pours himself a shot glass and knocks it back, and he slides into one of the many bar stools in front of the bar. Could be a misstep, but Victor’s been around Penguin enough over the years to gauge his true level of irritation. If he'd really intended to hit Victor in the head with the stein he would have, no question. “I meant what I said about the highest bidder.”

Penguin waves him off. “You’re tainted. If I were to genuinely hire you for anything other than _this_ ,” he gestures to the boxes, “the city would turn on me. _One_ of us knows how to keep business flowing.”

Victor turns his stool so he can side-eye the pile. “So you actually hired me to move shit for you.”

“I hired you so I could yell at you,” Penguin says matter-of-factly. “The fact that I’m going to make you move all of this nonsense to another location is an added bonus.” He pours himself a second shot, so that whole staying coherent thing probably isn’t going to last. “Mm, that’s sort of a lie. I’m going to _lambaste_ you. I find this new situation you find yourself in rather humorous, at your expense of course. I can't imagine you enjoying this, and that makes me rather pleased.”

“Thanks,” he deadpans. “Not really missing your guys?”

“Lieutenants are a dime a dozen. It's not like I  lost anyone irreplaceable.” Penguin shrugs. “And it's not the first time I've had to halt certain operations. The beauty of covering your illegal business with legitimate is the _legitimate_ ones can continue on unhindered when the illegal need to be,” he makes a sliding motion with his hand, “swept under the rug, on a temporary basis, of course, though I can't say for how long. I can't really tell someone like _you_ the details. You understand.”

Jesus, he really did pay Victor just so he could sit here, get drunk, and drag him for working with The Batman. He should have haggled the price.

“Doesn't feel like you're really that pissed at me,” Victor says. He catches Penguin's shrug out of the corner of his eye. “Bet you think we're even. We're really not.”

“I don't suppose you could develop a selective memory in your advanced age,” Penguin sighs. “Really, Victor, as much as it pains me to admit it I've had to do a bit of maturing through the years. You weren't even really my employee, you were, and arguably still are, a gun for hire. What good does it do for me to pursue this further than I already have?”

“Oddly kind of you,” Victor comments. He mentally thanks the vodka (or old age or, reluctantly, Riddler managing to be attentive for once) for mellowing Penguin out. “Guess you're a changed man.”

“Some would say the same about you, Mr Vigilante,” Penguin says, loudly, but it's the vodka yelling.

“Not really,” Victor says, shrugging. “I wouldn't have joined his ragtag team if he wasn't paying me. It's not like I had some sort of moral epiphany.”

“It’s a blow for Rogue-kind either way.” He feels the hand clunk against his suit before he sees Penguin move, and he stares down at the clumsy attempt at familiarity with mild disgust. “Victor, really, if all you wanted was to be a kept man you could have just said so. I'd have welcomed you back into my list of permanent employees with open arms.”

“I doubt that,” Victor eyes the third of vodka missing from the bottle and then up to the flush coloring Penguin's round cheeks. Advanced age is really catching up with this guy. He kind of wants to stick around for the hangover, kind of. “You already have a kept man. Think he'd get jealous.”

“Ha, well, you may be right,” Penguin chuckles and pulls back his hand.

“You'd think that would mean you could get him to listen to you.”

“You're a fool,” Penguin sputters through a laugh. “I have no problem calling Ed a kept man but he's hardly _contained_. You can't imagine the conversation it took to convince him to gut his hideout.”

“I can, actually.” He's seen it all before. “Ran out of room?”

“No, but not for a lack of trying. The amount of clutter he packed into that space is _obscene._ That's not even half of it,” he waves to the pile of boxes full of Riddler's little “treasures” or whatever he calls his hoarders nest of crap. “It's been compromised ever since Two Face couldn't resist trying to muscle in on _my_ territory-”

“ _Next_ to your territory.”

“It took me this long to get him to agree to move into the Lounge’s basement. God knows there's room, but he's fussy about his space.”

“I didn't pick him,” Victor says. Penguin shrugs, very what-can-you-do about his disaster of a partner. “Well, this was a bit more friendly than I was prepared to deal with,” Victor says as he slides off the stool. “Why don't we go back to you being mad at me and I'll start hauling Riddler's shit into your basement.”

There's this perfect combination of Penguin, no Riddler in sight, and a glass of alcohol in his prissy hands that makes spending a bit of time in his company tolerable, almost pleasant. He's easy to rile but hard to actually piss off if he's doing it right, and for all the violence and crime he's a pretty smart guy. There are worse conversationalists in this city. Hell, he works for one.

“Oh, Victor,” Penguin coos once Victor’s started circling the pile of nonsense. “I do have one other thing,” he says offhandedly; Victor grunts to signal he’s at least half listening. “As you’re aware my boy has resumed classes.”

“Yep,” Victor says. He picks up a faberge egg from the pile; the surface is littered with dozens of stones, all in varying green shades. Seems about right. “What about him?”

“It seems he has an assignment,” Penguin gushes, “and he wants to do well, _obviously_ , so when he approached me with a question I said I would help. He’s supposed to do an interview-”

“I don’t think I’m going to like where this is going.”

“And he’d _love_ to interview you and your new employee about your new arrangement.”

Victor closes his eyes and rests his forehead against a nearby box. Martin’s such a little shit and yet Penguin dotes on the boy like he’s a genuine saint. But Victor offers the same brand of allowances to his trusty old test tube shaker, which works fine as long as he wears some ear plugs and ignores the way it tries to take the nearby electronics down when it starts up. He can relate to Penguin’s unconditional adoration for the brat he’s dragged into his family.

But he’ll move to the equator before he sits down in a room and actually talks with the boy. “Pass.”

Penguin laughs under his breath. “I know we’ve been rather amicable,” he says, “but don’t let that give you the impression that this was a request instead of your coming reality.”

Victor takes a moment to carefully return the egg to its box and rounds the pile. Penguin’s not smiling, and his voice drops an octave, all low and slow, and anyone who says he’s at his most threatening when he’s yelling hasn’t gotten the chance to see him when he’s furious, but measured. Or they have and they didn’t survive the experience.

“You gave The Batman the job I sent you,” he continues. “I lost a few lieutenants to Blackgate for a few days before my lawyer was able to find a little problem with the GCPD’s chain of evidence.” He shrugs. “But if you’d gotten Ed thrown into Arkham or, god forbid, _Martin_ was involved, we would not be talking right now. You would have already been _dead_ for several weeks, and they would have just found your body in the bay.”

“Okay.” That’s all he’s got. Basically nothing.

“It’s in your best interest to keep the two of them out of your business with The Batman.”

“Uh huh,” Victor lets out a loud breath. “So,” he points to the boxes, “I’m going to just do this now.”

“Ed’s waiting for you downstairs,” Penguin says, and Victor bites the inside of his cheek. Best to keep insults out of the equation for now, at least until he’s out of Penguin’s earshot. He slides his goggles down and grabs one of the top boxes off the pile. “Some of my low level grunts will be bringing in more items once you’ve cleared more space. And don’t drop anything,” he sighs, “because if I have to deal with him whining about lost items then so do you, but I’m sure The Batman wouldn’t mind shelling out for your hospital bill when he learns you got whatever injury I inflict upon you while handling Ed’s stolen goods.”


	7. Chapter 7

Even though Victor questions his own logic of throwing himself at yet another near death experience so soon after Penguin about dissected him without laying a finger on him he accepts the next job Bruce throws at him without even feigning some sort of put out attitude. It might be for the allyship, which has never felt truly genuine but beats sitting around in his lab shaking off the reality that, joking aside, he stared death in the face a few nights ago without a single person there to back him up.

Okay, so he's feeling dramatic. It's not the first time Penguin has wanted to maim him, it's just the first time since he's monetarily aligned himself with the Batman. It's just the new perspective that's screwing with his chill.

Or that may be the view, which is limited through the Batmobile’s windshield (and he will never, ever get over the name of this _car_ ) and hasn’t even had a rat scurry across it let alone an actual person. Gets old after about ten minutes.

“Didn’t realize jobs with you could be so exciting,” he deadpans.

Bruce sighs, “I’m sorry. Commissioner Gordon gave me a tip about Two Face’s men and he was very certain about the timeframe the robbery was supposed to take place. I expected this to be done an hour ago.” He turns to Victor and leans his head against his headrest. “I’m sorry I pulled you away from whatever you’d intended to do with your evening.”

“Still getting paid, right?” he asks, and Bruce nods. “Then you aren’t keeping me from anything that important.”

Bruce chuckles. “I wish more Rogues were motivated the way you are. It would be much easier if I could just pay everyone to stop breaking the law so much.”

“Got that kind of liquid funds available?”

“I could work something out, possibly designate it as some sort of charity.”

“For Rogues?”

“For the people they normally terrorize,” Bruce says, and Victor snorts. “On a more serious note if you had any recommendations I’d take them.”

It’s not a bad idea. Or, in a different city with different crazy criminals it would be a good idea. He can think of a few, no, a lot of Rogues it wouldn’t work for. Most of them, at least 90%. “There’s not a lot.”

“Give me five.” Victor makes a disbelieving face. “Is it too much to ask for three?”

“It might be.”

“One, then.”

Victor sucks in a deep breath through his teeth, whistling out half the breath before muttering, “Crane.”

“Really?”

On second thought, “scratch that, changed my mind.” He can’t _imagine_ what kind of hell Crane would get himself into if he had a bigger budget. “Really, it wouldn’t happen.”

“I’m interested to know why you said his name at all.”

Victor looks over, but it’s hard to interpret Bruce’s expression through the cowl. He sounds sincere enough, doesn’t look too snarky. “He’s financially motivated, but also kind of flaky.” Pot-kettle, good thing Crane’s not here to drag him. “You know how I just want money? Some stuff he does just for fun.”

“Ah,” Bruce nods sagely. “And you don’t do things for fun?”

“It’s not really my thing,” he says idly, and then he points out the windshield. “Looks like Gordon came through after all.”

“Go to the back entrance to flank them and I’ll move in from the front,” and there he goes without waiting for questions, of which Victor has several. He’s starting to see a pattern.

Victor doesn’t leap out of the Batmobile as much as he sort of uses an oozing osmosis to make his way onto the street and ambles over to the back door with his gun in one hand and his other pushing his goggles down over his eyes. Should be a quick in and out. The only reason Victor is even here is just how frequently Two Face loves to be on the front line, but he didn’t notice any wild two-toned suits among the handful of guys breaking down the front door.

And the back door is locked. Of course. Victor side-eyes the main street and shoots a quick blast of his freeze gun at the lock, then uses his full weight to break it open. He can hear the commotion up front as Bruce tries to apprehend the divisible by two gaggle of goons. There’s the sound of some glass display cases breaking, probably spilling the fancy handguns all over the floor. He doesn’t really see what’s so important about these particular guns, but Two Face must have or they wouldn’t have sent men in after them.

It’s while he’s musing about the possibility of a double barrelled pistol that he’s rushed by one of the goons, and he fires off a couple blind freeze shots, but misses. The man collides with him and sends him sprawling to the ground. Something in his suit cracks and sends a nasty little shock running down his leg. Victor hisses as the shock fades to a dull tingling, and he fires off a successful shot before the guy can get through the back door. Leg shot, good enough, but if he keeps moving like that he’s going to snap them off.

Bruce comes barreling into the back room and stops short when he finds Victor slowly getting up off the floor and the man still trying to yank off his feet in the attempt to get his ice cube legs to move. “The other three have zip ties on their wrists until the GCPD can arrive.”

“He’s not going anywhere,” Victor rasps out. “Electrocution makes you taste pennies, right?”

“Are you injured?” Bruce kneels down and helps Victor stand, but getting up and standing are two different demons and Victor can only tackle one of them at the moment. Good thing Bruce didn’t go anywhere because faceplanting sounds pretty shitty. “Did he have a taser?”

“Buzzed myself,” Victor says, “unintentionally. Heard something crack in my suit during the landing.” Victor wipes his brow and a smattering of frozen sweat droplets fall to the floor. “That’s probably bad.”

“You’re rapidly descending into heat stroke,” Bruce says urgently.

“Yeah that sounds about right.” Victor lifts his freeze gun up and angles it so he can fire a quick shot of ice down inside his non-functional suit. It’s a terrible band-aid solution but it’s not _nothing_ , plus Bruce’s stricken expression is kind of priceless. Definitely one for the memory banks. “You should probably get me home.”

Bruce shakes his head. “The Manor is closer.” He’s doing more dragging than aiding Victor as they leave the back of the store and head back to the Batmobile. “Would it help or just hurt to use air conditioning?”

“Leave it off.” Victor contemplates adding another layer of ice to the inside of his suit but through the heat induced delirium he knows cleaning the inside of the suit is already going to be a nightmare. Hard to find cleaning solvents that don’t freeze. “You got a walk in freezer or something? Going to just stick me in there with your groceries?”

“I have something.”

“Sounds kind of ominous,” Victor says. Bruce doesn't reply, which makes it worse, but Victor needs to focus on staying upright and conscious so it's not a big deal.

Wayne Manor’s just as excessively massive as Victor always saw in newspaper photos, but there’s something about seeing it in person that really makes the size hit home. Bruce makes a show of rounding the entire perimeter of the grounds, or Victor thought he was making a show of it, but some of the stone wall lifts up like a garage door and Bruce pulls into a huge space that can only be the Batcave.

He can’t really parse what he’s seeing. Metal, some natural rock formations, but things are getting fuzzy around the edges. Heat’s getting to him; Bruce practically picks him up to get him out of the passenger’s seat, and the trend continues as they move past a lot of blurry, glinting metal and some blinking lights. He really hopes it’s actually lights and not, well, his vision. If it isn’t then he’s drifting into some permanent damage territory, or worse.

“He’s going into heat shock,” Bruce says to another blurry mass that’s probably a person. “Quickly, get the door.”

“You can admit you’re stashing me away in your walk in freezer,” Victor mumbles. “Really, won’t be offended. Might even make myself at home with your ice cream.”

There’s a long pause before Bruce says, “we’ll get you something to eat once you’ve cooled down.”

There’s a rush of pleasant air that hits his face and Victor gets his vision to start behaving long enough to focus on the doorway leading to… something he’s not exactly thrilled to see. “So, I know I’m sort of dying but can we take a second for you to explain the part where you have a room just for me in your little hero cave?” Bruce’s grimace speaks volumes. “I think I should feel offended.”

“This was constructed long before we worked out our current working partnership,” Bruce explains.

“Mr Fries,” another, older, less patient voice snaps Victor’s attention to the right; Bruce’s butler/guardian appears to be in on his nighttime hobby, “I’d recommend you make some amount of haste to ensure your body temperature ceases to rise past dangerous levels.”

“Right.” He fumbles with some of the clatches and whatnot for his suit, shoving Bruce off when he attempts to help and stumbling towards the blessed cold. “Not in the mood to get burned,” he says casually. Bruce stops trying to be the hero and lets Victor finish stripping down to his underthings. He looks down at his suit and gives it a little kick to get it out of the way of the door.

Bruce takes his lazy frustration as some sort of hint and picks it up by the arms. “We’ll make the proper repairs while you rest.”

“The valve’s are finicky,” Victor offers. Not what valve, not in what way, but Bruce is a smart guy, and Victor drags the door shut on his own before either of the two men can ask for any clarification.

“Definitely going to act offended,” he murmurs to himself. The temperature is pleasant, and a vent in the ceiling keeps pumping in the subzero air at a steady stream. One alcove has a full sized bed, which still feels pliant and comfortable when Victor tests the corner. There’s probably something interesting in the storage cabinets on the other walls but it doesn’t matter right now. Victor drops onto the bed and makes a grab for the sheets, but he doesn’t reach them before passing out.

-

Okay, so it’s not like he was actually afraid or anything, but waking up in a strange place is still jarring. He spends an extra few minutes staring at the ceiling of the cell to get his bearings; there’s a niggling little bit of uncertainty that just won’t let go. He’s going to be really bummed if the door doesn’t open when he tries it, although even if it does open it’s not like he’s getting far before turning back.

Guy can afford to build an entire cell in his underground cave basement/hideout but he can’t manage to install some sort of intercom?

Every part of Victor’s body protests when he rolls off the bed and onto his feet. He can’t stand up straight for the first few steps, but as he moves towards the door he groans when a particularly satisfying crack in his back allows him to straighten.

He can’t decide if it really would be that awful to have to stay down here for awhile. Make someone else responsible for his lack of progress on any sort of cure.

But when he tries the door the only resistance is from the seal, and then the nasty rush of hot air makes him step back. The noise from the door already alerted Bruce from across the room, but Victor feels like dragging him about the cell anyway. “Can I come out for good behavior?”

Bruce slows his jog to a stride and laughs under his breath. “Your suit should be repaired by now, I’ll go check.”

“You didn’t repair it?” Victor asks under his breath. He's not sure he- no he is sure he hates the idea of someone else's hands having unmonitored access to the one thing keeping him from keeling over on a “pleasant” spring day. The only thing keeping him tethered to the freezer (aside from the obvious health risks involved with running after Bruce) is the fact that the guy must have trusted this person to enter the Batcave-God there’s still a part of him that just can’t cope with that word- then it’s probably okay to trust them to fix a few cracked components on his suit.

The fear he’d stomped down from earlier comes back when he switches on the climate controls for his suit, but they kick on just like they always do. He’s never been so thankful to feel the stale recycled air as it combats the warmth all of Bruce’s machines and computers put off into the normally cool cave space. Victor saunters over to Bruce’s computer station and stands to his left, watching him while he watches various police radios ping up on a giant map of the city that spans across several large screens.

He doesn’t turn around when he says, “I take it the repairs were successful.”

“Seems so,” Victor sighs, letting the rest of that tension leak out with it. “Got a busy night?”

“The GCPD does,” he says, bringing up a few short descriptions of some muggings and robberies, one car crash on the bridge slowing down traffic and another near the northmost way to leave the city. “The Commissioner and I have an agreement. I stand back during these crimes unless called specifically for assistance.”

“Stepped on too many toes?”

“And stretched myself a bit too thin in the process. It’s hard to compete with an entire police force.” He minimizes all the radio calls and pushes his chair back from the console before spinning it around to stand. “For now I’ll take you home. I’m sure you have plenty to catch up on having slept through the entire day.”

Well fuck, there goes his sleep pattern. “I’m sure I can find some things.”

“This way,” Bruce gestures to a benign looking set of stone steps between what can only be described as a wall of trophies of the other Rogue’s shit and a clean, well lit series of cabinets and a stainless steel table probably used as a first aid station. “We’ll take something a bit less conspicuous than the Batmobile.”

-

On the way out to the garage Bruce waves some teenager along without offering any sort of explanation, and Victor spends the first five minutes of the drive tipping his head back to get another look at the kid and side-eyeing Bruce’s profile. He wishes he could remember how old Bruce is, or maybe how to tell how old people are without a cake with numbers in front of them.

Bruce breathes out a laugh and turns to Victor. “You can ask.”

“You old enough to have a teenager?”

Another chuckle. He's in weirdly good mood. “Why don’t you introduce yourself, Dick?”

The kid pops his head up from whatever he’s been messing with and leans forward between the seats. He holds out a hand, and Victor’s not one for pleasantries but he can’t deny the kid when he’s so bright and smiley. “Richard Grayson,” he says, “people call me Dick.”

“People are cruel.”

“Holy crap, I don’t think people are doing it to be jerks!” Victor watches the corners of Bruce’s mouth crinkle up as he keeps his laugh in check. “Oh, you're joking aren't you.”

“I have a dry wit.” Bruce shakes his head and Victor chocks this up as a victory for the night. “I'm going to go out on a limb and say you're not in the dark about his night job.”

“I met him during my might job. Dick's parents were the Flying Graysons.”

“Were,” Victor clarifies. Bruce nods, and Victor has enough sense to read the room. “Sorry kid.”

“It was a few years ago,” Dick says, shrinking into himself a bit, but he perks back up quickly. “Sometimes I help on cases.”

“Got yourself a sidekick,” Victor concludes.

“The Commissioner won't let me go out on patrols yet though,” Dick grumbles. Kid's actually bummed about doing something Bruce has to pay him to do. Weird kid. “But I fixed your suit!”

“ _You_ fixed my suit?”

“He's been experimenting with mechanics in his free time. He took apart my coffee maker the other day.” There's more than a hint of joking irritation in Bruce's voice. “Alfred was there to assist with your suit. I would have leant a hand but I got called away to the office.”

“Feels like you did a decent job,” Victor tells Dick and his face lights up. He won't mention the second check he's planning on doing in his lab.

“I just had to replace some wiring and realign the main ventilation motor,” he says as if _anyone_ could have done it. “Is this the only suit you have?”

“One of a kind,” Victor says. “It does the job.”

“I didn’t know a portable system could reach those temperatures without a crazy huge heat output.” This kid basically admitted to essentially being the adopted child of the Batman and he thinks Victor's glorified portable air conditioner is fascinating. “I have one question, though.”

“Shoot.”

“Why haven't you made something more practical to use for, like, a backup?” Victor doesn't know how to answer that. He just blinks. “Holy crap I didn't mean to make it sound like that.”

“Richard-”

“I'm sorry! The suit is really cool and making _one_ is already kind of amazing,” and he just keeps rambling but Victor's kind of tuned out of the car a little bit.

“Complacency,” is the only word Victor can come up with that feels right. Dick's rambling halts after the interruption, and the queasy fear on his face settles into only being mildly stricken. “Just never thought about it.”

He's spent the last decade and some change trying to just _undo_ this. He never really considered making his current state more livable than absolutely necessary.

“I'm really, really sorry,” Dick gushes.

“Don't sweat it,” Victor waves him off. “I'll pick your brain later if I get around to it. Sound good?” Dick nods furiously, and Victor turns back around in his seat. “Good.”


	8. Chapter 8

He can’t believe he’s doing this.

No, that’s an oversimplification. Victor can believe he’s sitting in the back of the Iceberg Lounge waiting for Penguin’s bratty teenager, or maybe he’s a young adult now, to show up so he can get his damn interview. It’s exactly what Penguin demanded of his free time.

It’s more like, ‘he can’t believe he didn’t just let Penguin fridge him’ or ‘he can’t believe he didn’t just hide out in Bruce’s basement until the damn class demanding Martin do this is over’, but he didn’t, so he’s sitting around with some weird nitrogen martini Penguin’s  _ other _ brat thrust into his hand the second he stepped through the door. The color reminds him of Bruce’s cell. He’s not sure that should be comforting, but something about it is. Maybe the alcohol content, which is strong enough to smell without having to shove his nose that far into the glass.

He’s always hated sickly sweet drinks, and the cloying, absolutely  _ nasty _ berry flavor dominating the drink is a definite turnoff, as is the lukewarm temperature. He’ll concede that point as no one’s fault but his own, but he should have had the hindsight to request some of the liquid nitrogen come with him into the back room so he could turn this drink into a glorified popsicle and maybe actually enjoy it.

Aforementioned brat pops his head in and grins that damn Cheshire grin at Victor. “I trust my saccharine spirituous libation was a success?”

Victor hands him the nearly full glass, declaring, “I don't like sweet things.”

“Oh,” Riddler frowns down at the drink, “that won't do.”

“Why'd you give me that?”

“Oswald said you'd be here for an hour, maybe two-”  _ TWO _ ? “-if you and Martin become engrossed in your discussions.”

“I'd shoot closer to one,” Victor says. He's shooting for five minutes but he has a feeling someone isn't going to let him get away with that.

“Still plenty of time,” he exclaims. (“For  _ what _ , exactly?”) “We'll extract your essence yet.”

Victor can't. He can't deal with this guy on top of everything else. “I think I'll keep my essence to myself.”

If this idiot laughs maybe it'll all be worth it- “I'm concocting a series of themed drinks, per Oswald's request-” damn it- “hence the liquid nitrogen, meant to imitate this little visual effect,” he waves a hand through the visible vapors around Victor's face, “so I suppose the only thing missing is the right flavor profile. What would you say your favorite flavor is? In the interest of saving time.”

“Salt.”

Riddler's face puffs up, guy's about to blow several gaskets, but he holds in his little tantrum. Doesn't keep it together enough to not pout, or stamp his fancy boots with frustration. “I  _ know _ you're saying that to mess with me,” he snaps, “but you're going to have a play on a  _ salty dog _ coming your way.”

“That makes me sound like a pirate.”

“Maybe I'll just throw  _ ice cubes  _ at the patrons to properly capture your  _ personality _ .”

“Sounds good.” Riddler can't come up with a strong retort, so he settles with his trademark fume and flee. “Thank God.”

It doesn't last. He hardly has time to exhale before Martin's poking his curly head into the room. If Victor didn't know better he'd swear the kid was Ed's secret love child, but he can't imagine a woman willing to spend long enough with him to get that far. He still can't figure out how Penguin manages without killing him.

“He's got to be a really amazing lay,” he mutters, loud enough for Martin to hear. It doesn't scare him off like Victor hoped, but the series of signs he directs at Victor feel like he's complaining about his crude, unprompted comment. “I never did learn sign language, kid.”

Martin sighs the sigh of another very put out, dramatic man and pulls out his old notepad, beat up around the corners and scratched to hell and back, but functional enough for his quick scrawl.  _ Ed's mad about something. I'm guessing you're involved. _

“Safe guess.” Victor shrugs one shoulder. “Messing with Riddler's always been easy.” And he continues before Martin can finish his reply. “He's making a drink that's supposed to remind people of me.”

Martin crosses out the original message dark enough to make it unreadable and writes another.  _ Where's The Batman? _

“Working?” Martin huffs. “Look, there's no way he was coming. You can't get everything you want just because the Penguin's sort of your dad.”

Another pouty little chuff, and another terse note.  _ You didn't tell him to come, did you? _

“Nope.”

Martin slumps into a cross armed pout Victor is certain works too well on the boy's guardians, Penguin especially. Victor doesn't get it, any of it really. Riddler's a walking green bean of disaster and Martin, clearly a distilled mishmash of the two of them, isn't much better, he just knows how to hide it behind a young face and a librarian's fashion sense. He really can't stand either of them, and yet they're still more than Penguin deserves.

Wait.

Oh no.

“Oh fuck,” he whispers. He can't look Martin in the eye, it's too much. He's  _ jealous _ . Of  _ Penguin _ .

Well that's the most depressing thing he's realized about himself in a long while. This is why he doesn't do introspection. It's never anything he wants to hear.

“Look,” Martin does, and he's still pouting like a child, but the little shit is still going to get his way despite Victor's better judgement, “I’m going to preface this with the absolute fact that your little routine is not what swayed me.” And he's smirking like the brat he is but Victor is taking the real truth with him to the grave, so he can think what he wants because it's better than reality. “I'm not calling him down here, that's not changing. But I've had a humbling, and more importantly off the record, realization about some things, so if you are dead set on this stupid interview I'll field your questions to the guy. No guarantees he'll answer.”

Martin starts writing before Victor even finishes talking. He's a lucky shit. If he said no Penguin would have stormed in the second he heard, and Victor can't face him right now without wanting to die a little. He's always been too good at sussing out the things Victor doesn't want people to know.

Martin's prepared his first question, a thought provoking,  _ do you find yourself nervous with Mr. Freeze as your ally? _

“Yeah, that guy's kind of an asshole,” he says. Martin rolls his eyes. He snaps a photo of the question with his phone and sends it to Bruce. “Guess you can pick my brain while we wait.”

-

Victor doesn't put a lot of stock in lucky coincidences. He can't remember having any, so they were either nonexistent or just too superfluous to matter in the grand scheme of things.

Today he'll make an exception.

On his way down from his rats he finds a trail of blood, and said trail leads all the way to his lab door, and behind his door he finds Crane sitting against the wall and holding a bloody cloth against his leg.

“So uh,” Victor starts, loudly, and Crane jumps out of his skin but his face is eerily calm, “I hope this is one of those 'you should see the other guy' moments.”

“He's dead,” Crane says. “A two-bit thug’s attempt to terrify was thwarted by myself.”

“Oh-kay,” Victor whistles. Weird, really lyrical and kind of Tetch-ish. Might be shock. “So did you get grazed by something-? Oh that's not a graze. Okay.”

“It missed the artery, if only just.” Crane lifts the cloth again to show off the hole in his leg, definitely from a bullet, and it's gotta still be in there or he wouldn't have crawled all this way without leaving a bigger trail. “It would be awfully dreadful to bleed out with you just standing there.”

“Right,” Victor steps over Crane's legs and moves into his lab. His inner thought process isn't being all that helpful, having settled somewhere between blank nothingness and some distressed wailing. He grabs the first thing that solidifies in his head, his freeze gun, and he tips Crane's hand out of the way long enough to blast his wound with enough ice to act as a makeshift tourniquet.

Crane's awfully offended at him when he just helped keep the guy from bleeding out on his lab floor. “My doctorate is in cryogenics. I don't know what you want from me.”

“Help!” He shouts. Which, fair, but it's not like this  _ hurt _ him. God his pupils are gigantic. Like, he maybe definitely took or had already taken something to alter his person gigantic.

His hands are shaking.

“This will stop the bleeding, but it's still in there,” he says softly. Crane tsks and starts reaching for the ice. Victor uses the top of his gun to knock his hand away. “Don't. Here,” he drops to one knee and makes Crane loop one arm around Victor's shoulders. “I got a place we can go for help. You're lucky I already had my suit on.”

“Yes, I feel it,” he deadpans, hissing when standing jostles his leg.

“Don't flex the muscle too much.” He doesn't  _ think _ his leg will shatter if he moves it but he's going to err on the side of caution. “It'll be fine once it thaws.”

“You say that with unnerving confidence.”

“I only make the stuff that's safe.”

Crane weighs about as much as an actual scarecrow, wimpy straw filled body and all. It's good, because Victor's trying to haul ass while he limps along side him, so he's mostly just carrying his dead weight past the long blood trail. Jesus that's probably a bad amount of blood to leave lying around like that. It looks like he murdered some poor bastard and dragged their corpse into his lab.

He hefts Crane into the passenger seat of his van and climbs into the driver's seat. Crane's shakes are getting worse; he's probably coming down off whatever high he was on.

“You aren't looking so hot.”

“You froze my leg.”

Victor rolls his eyes. “Your pupils are huge. No judgement, but you should tell my guy you took something. Could react with whatever he uses to fix you up.”

“It's an antidote,” Crane hisses. “I synthesized it, and now I've had the fortune to test it.”

_ Or the misfortune _ . Victor watches Crane death grip his seatbelt. He misses the weird calm from earlier; Crane's eyes might fall out of his head if he opens them any wider.

“What's the antidote for?” He's responding well to soft voices. Might send that little tidbit Bruce's way when Crane can't hear and get unreasonably pissy.

“Fear,” he whispers. “A bonding agent, capable of converting cortisol into a harmless byproduct.”

Victor takes a moment to appreciate the fact that there is a predictable amount of traffic this evening, because it's the only thing that isn't batshit about this situation. “You know, your body kind of needs that.”

“An excess of anything can be deadly.”

He can't. He really just can't. “I'm not a physiologist,” he says carefully, “but I'm pretty sure you'll keep producing more cortisol until we dig that bullet out of your leg.” Crane's throat clicks when he swallows. “You didn't get rid of your fear. You just delayed it.”

Crane keeps his shit “together” for another few minutes, but he smacks at the automatic windows after they cross the bridge connecting midtown to uptown and starts throwing up out the window. Maybe it's all that harmless byproduct, but Victor's pretty sure it's just more of that good old garden variety fear taking over. When he's done making a mess of the pavement, and probably the side of Victor's van, he spends the rest of the drive doing some eight count breathing with his eyes closed.

It's hard to tell where driveway ends and the fancy decorative brick walkway begins at Wayne Manor, but this probably qualifies as an emergency, so Victor parks just shy of the stairs leading to the front door and practically carries Crane to the door. He knocks a few dozen times until someone opens the door, and he gives Alfred a little wave with his arm that isn't holding Crane upright.

“Mr Fries,” he says, surprise coated with that courteous tone, “why are you here, exactly?”

“This guy's got a bullet in his leg,” he explains calmly. “Thought you and yours could offer up some help.”

“Yes, that's  _ fine _ sir, but I meant why are you  _ here _ in particular. As in, the front steps of Wayne Manor?”

Victor blinks and looks up at the threshold, and back down to Alfred, and  _ then  _ it clicks why this might have been poor planning on his part. “I think I panicked.”

“I see,” Alfred sighs, “well, no use dwelling on that now. Bring him in. We'll see what we can do for Mr Crane.”

“Wasn't sure he'd recognize you,” he tells Crane, who's boggling at the interior of the Manor as they move towards Bruce's secret entrance in his study. “Right, this will start making more sense soon.”

Beyond Crane's absolutely priceless expression of shock seeing the doorway open up there's this undercurrent of disappointment. Probably with himself, because Victor also felt like he should have seen this one ages ago but didn't until it smacked him in the face. He side eyes Victor, but he's not in a position to deny free medical assistance, even if the guy giving it to him actively tries to lock him up in Arkham.

“Alfred told me you'd stopped by,” Bruce calls from his computer monitors. “He didn't say why,” and his face when he sees Crane is about as priceless as Crane's was, “oh.”

“Oh?” Victor chuckles. “Didn't think I'd ever see you speechless.” Crane elbows him, and hisses because he elbowed a glorified set of armor and not Victor's vulnerable side. “So, this guy has a bullet in his leg. We were kind of hoping you'd take a look at it once his leg thaws out.”

“When it th-ah, I see.” He strides past them to the medical station Victor saw his first time in the Batcave and motions for them to follow. “Let’s get him on the gurney. Alfred's the one that usually patches me up after patrol. He should be able to help.”

Once Crane is sprawled out on the thin, paper covered mattress of the gurney Victor taps Bruce's shoulder. “Got a second?” Victor motions to with his head, and Bruce takes a moment to urge Crane to lie down before joining Victor out of earshot. “So, he knows who you are. My bad.”

Bruce looks back at Crane and sighs. “There’s nothing we can do about it now.”

“He also might be a little bit high, or something like that.” Bruce's eyebrows shoot up. “This one's all him. I don't know what he did, but he made it himself.” Victor sighs. “You know, saying that out loud makes it sound worse.”

“It's not uncommon for someone to make foolish decisions under stress.” Okay, so  _ that's  _ probably about him as much as it's about Crane. Harsh, but also fair. “He should be fine, but I'll make sure Alfred knows before he gives him anything for the pain.” Bruce turns away to return to Crane, who's getting a little whiny over on the gurney.

“He's kind of a candyass,” he says, loudly. Crane glares at him, but he can't hide all the gratitude under his prickly exterior. Victor nods to him, and then he moves to another part of the lab where he and his useless doctorate won't get in the way of Crane's treatment.


	9. Chapter 9

Victor doesn't have a frame of reference for the length of time required to clean up Crane's leg wound. An hour? Two? Maybe all night if his “antidote” causes any complications? He settles in for the long haul; the cell is much more inviting when he has his suit in here with him, and Victor passes out for a few blissful hours once his adrenaline bottoms out.

A few knocks on the heavy metal door drag him out of his sleep, and he stares up at the ceiling with the unfortunate realization that Crane will never let him live down the fact that his gut instinct to keep him from bleeding out was to freeze his leg.

Despite his line of work he's never really been that far in the thick of things. Panic isn't something he's developed a good way to work through. Crane should consider himself lucky he didn't freeze his whole body.

He shakes off the faded memories threatening to work their way to the foreground and starts pulling his suit on. Crane's going to need to buy another ride, and Victor needs to hose off the side of the van. And there's the part where he accidentally unmasked Bruce. He has enough to think about without falling into another funk.

The damn seal on the door makes him think he's been locked in again, but it gives way and the rush of hot air fogs up Victor's goggles. He shoves them onto his forehead and takes some time to survey the Batcave and its current occupants.

Crane's still on the gurney, alone, and there's a thick pad of medical gauze visible through the tear in his pants. He's snoring softly through his nose, steady and calm for once in his life. Victor is having a hard time keeping himself from disturbing Crane's sleep, but a throat clearing near the stairs stops him from caving.

“Is this the part where you say he's lucky to be alive?”

Bruce shakes his head. “The longest part of the procedure was thawing out his leg. Whoever shot him was using a small caliber weapon.” He looks over to Crane, but he's directing his question at Victor. “You wouldn't happen to know more about the events prior, would you? He wasn't very talkative during the procedure.”

“I just found him in my lab.” And there's the clear and honest admission but he'd bet his suit Crane wasn't the instigator. He never does any of his fear projects without his mask on. “Don’t feel too disappointed. He's not real talkative period.”

“I’m not sure that fills me with confidence now that he knows who I am.”

“It wasn't meant to.” Victor side-eyes Crane and sighs. “I dropped the ball on that one.”

“He was injured. You were worried.”

“He did get a lot of blood on my sidewalk.” He knows what Bruce was trying to determine, but his association with Crane has never been strictly business related. Even he needs a little socialization every few weeks. “We should probably get going.”

“We?”

Uh oh. “I figure you'll want your gurney freed up in case you fall off a roof.”

“Once he's had a chance to fully recover Jonathan Crane is returning to Arkham.” Victor knew he was going to say it but it still gives him a gut punch feeling. “He's not going to get the help he needs on Gotham's streets.”

Victor glances at Crane; his eyes are open. Bruce hasn't noticed yet. “Arkham doesn't really do it for him.”

“I can't offer him the same allowances I offer you. You're right, he does what he does because he wants to, and that's not going to change without some sort of intervention.”

Crane's sitting up now, slowly. He hasn't made a peep. “He's been minding his business lately.”

“You could just as easily call it biding his time.” Bruce sighs. “I’m not asking you to bring him there, but I  _ will _ , and I wanted you to know that.”

Crane holds a finger to his mouth and Victor can see the branching outcomes playing in his head. He lets Crane be an idiot and attack Bruce and the kid is going to Arkham before he can lay a finger on him. Or he stops Crane himself, and there goes… whatever this association is between them. Tolerant neighbors feels right.

So we just does neither and lets his instincts take charge, and  _ apparently _ that just means he's shooting another person in the legs with his freeze gun. He coats Bruce from the hip down, and it shocks not only him but  _ also _ Crane, who freezes in place with one leg still resting on the gurney.

Bruce isn't even talking, he's just staring at Victor, betrayed. Clearly his instincts are not to be trusted, but it's too late now, he's burned this bridge to ashes.

“I wouldn't try to move until you thaw,” he says casually. “I’m going to take him home.”

He bears most of the weight on Crane's injured side, fully embracing the endless string of “fuck” in his head as he avoids making eye contact with Bruce on their way to the stairs. What's done is done. He's surely a dead man but he told Crane he wouldn't deliver him to the Batman, and he doesn't make promises like that often but when he does he  _ keeps _ them.

They run into Alfred of all people, and Victor keeps his chill enough not to freeze him but his instincts got a taste of freedom and it's going to take some self discipline to keep them from setting up shop in his forebrain.

“Master Bruce requested I phone Commissioner Gordon regarding our patient,” he says, eyeing the two of them warily. “You and he don't appear to be on the same page.”

“I'll take that,” Victor says, reaching for the phone. He tells Gordon, “he left,” and hands it back. “He's about waist deep down there. Should thaw in a few hours.”

“I see,” Alfred sighs. He glances at Victor's freeze gun and gestures to the door. “As you were, gentlemen.”

But Alfred drops one more bomb on Victor as he leaves. “I believe the young Master was instructed to wash your car this morning. Should be good as new.”

Well crap. “Tell the kid I owe him,” he says, and after Alfred leaves he mutters, “It’s not like I can ever come back here and make it up to him anyway.” Cushy day job, gone. Time to do his experiments, out the window. And for what?

Crane grunts from discomfort, dragging Victor out of his thoughts, and he exhales loudly. Maybe having Crane around just makes him feel better about himself. Between the self experimentation and his roulette wheel of a mood he makes Victor look well adjusted by comparison.

Crane doesn't make another peep until they're nearly back, and Victor about doesn't hear the soft “thank you,” over the sound of the engine.

Victor's not sure what to say, so he avoids responding by diverting the topic. “Was it really just some thug you ran into?”

Crane tugs at his seat belt, twisting it in his hands. “Not exactly.”

“Uh huh.”

“Our encounter wasn't accidental.”

“Oh,” Victor hums. “Who'd you piss off?” Crane glares at him. “Someone shot you. Sounds pissed off to me.”

“I'm afraid we couldn't reach an agreement. One of Valeska's copycats was gunning for a bit of my Joker Venom at a steep discount.”

“Literally.”

“Don't,” Crane says softly, actually sounding  _ pained _ , the baby. He's the one that set Victor up.

“How'd you win that fight?”

Crane chuffs. “I haven't let go of my scythe.”

Victor laughs. “You're kidding me. You used a  _ scythe _ ?”

“I panicked,” Crane admits, smirking. Calling Victor out for his excuse from last night.

Victor shakes his head. “I really don't know how you're still alive sometimes.” He glances over when Crane doesn't respond, and finds him tracing the edge of the tear on his left pant leg. “Did they give you anything for that?”

“Single dose antibiotics,” Crane answers without looking up. “I have something for pain in my lab.”

“I think I'd steer clear of more of your home made medicines.” Crane doesn't answer.

He parks in the alley by Crane's building and follows Crane around to the front door and into his lab. It's been awhile since he's been in here and he feels like using the opportunity to snoop.

First glance, it's a shit hole. Dingy surfaces, dim lighting, and various twisted metal objects litter the counters and the floor surrounding his workspace. He should have asked for a tetanus shot from Bruce before they left.

Second glance, and a much more thorough one, the overall appearance holds a designed quality to the disarray. He's dug up some copper filament light bulbs and strewn them around the lab, hence the dim lighting, but there's a set of LEDs imbedded in the ceiling they are currently turned off. A swipe over one counter doesn't dislodge the grime; it's mottled, possibly paint, possibly something else, but it's not begging for a wipe down. It might even be cleaner than Victor's. The kid takes his aesthetic _ very _ seriously, but not quite as ride or die as he previously thought.

He follows Crane into a back hall behind a second security door. Crane stops off in a cream tiled bathroom with only a shower, no tub, and he pulls a very boring bottle of generic aspirin out of the medicine cabinet and pops a couple into his mouth before washing it down with tap water from the sink. He stares at his reflection in the mirror, blinking tiredly, and then he rips off his overcoat and shirt in one go, tossing them into a small bin nearby. Victor leaves the room so the kid can take a much needed shower, and so he can snoop around the rest of his private space.

The other room down the hall is a modest sized bedroom with very little clutter. A half desk in the dark corner has an open sewing kit with various spools and scraps of fabric littering the surface. The other far corner is occupied by a full sized bed with dark sheets and more pillows than Victor thinks is really necessary. A series of plastic milk crates across from the bed are filled with messily folded clothes, with the top two housing an assortment of food and snacks. The last corner has a giant setup with home welded wire panels and multiple tiers made out of scrap wood; it's the rats, Victor realizes, and a couple furry heads poke their noses out to sniff the air when he bends down to get a closer look.

It reminds Victor of college. It's small and simple, but functional, and more than sufficient for one scrawny young man and his troupe of rats. No kitchen, but he's already surprised enough that the kid even eats. He can't imagine him actually cooking anything that needs more than a microwave.

Being here, seeing this, feels wrong somehow. It's too domestic, too  _ normal _ . Last time Victor checked Crane still runs around with a bag on his head. No one was ever meant to see the guy's bedroom. It breaks the illusion.

The water stops in the bathroom and a series of tearing sounds echo down the hall to the bedroom. Probably dressing his wound. He slumps his way into the bedroom, wearing a giant towel and nothing else, and he pulls clothes out of the crates seemingly at random but somehow ends up in something that resembles sleep sweats.

“You look like shit.”

“Feel like it too,” he says without hesitation. He drops his glasses onto the top of one of the crates and drags a hand across his face. He looks like he hasn't slept in months.

“I can't believe you were going to attack the guy you  _ know _ could kick your ass into next week.”

“I can't believe you did it for me.” Okay, kid's on a winning streak and Victor doesn't need this in his life right now. Crane ends the dig fight for him by flopping onto the center of his bed and gathering up several of his pillows into a nest. “Turn that on,” he demands while pointing behind his back to the wall behind him.

Victor makes an educated assumption and turns on the only powered item he can find in the room, a strange, orb-like object on the corner of Crane's desk. It fills the room with a soft blue glow, and slow, deep tones start sounding off.

And that's enough discovering for one day. Victor flips off the overhead light on his way out of the bedroom and locks both of Crane's doors on his way out.

-

He goes home and lies low for a week. Bruce doesn't break down his door in the middle of the night, but he also doesn't call about any jobs. It gives him just enough free time to get plenty of work done in the lab and descend into a mild panic just about every damn day, so overall it's been great. Exactly what he needed.

Victor finds himself zoning out on more than one occasion, lost in a haxy half thought, but never for more than a few minutes. He'll worry about it later. Right now he's focused on today's dose of the cryoprotectant, and a rat that's been acting a little nutty for the past week and a half. Crane noted it as agitated when he ran the experiment, but Victor's not a fan of the term. The rat isn't chewing or pouncing at the other rats through the cages, it's just… off.

He activates the dispensers and the off rat flops over on to its side. It would be his luck to be some sort of astronomically improbable fluke. The cryoprotectants probably just give everything else cancer, or something equally sinister. Victor opens the top of its cage to check for any signs of life. He should have called Crane; at least he can handle them without getting tiny rat feet burns on his hands. Victor's suit doesn't give him enough dexterity or any sensation of touch.

Victor reaches into the cage and carefully lifts the limp rat out. Its nose twitches, but it doesn't rouse. He's not going to think it, because the minute he hopes it'll just get torn away from him. He holds it in one hand against his chest as he rushes back into his lab and sets the rat down on the closest counter.

Victor keeps his eye on the rat while he strips out of his suit far enough to free his hands. He brushes the tip of his ring finger across the rat's head, and it doesn't burn. There's a warmth to it; he knew that, it's not a surprise, but he'd forgotten what it feels like. He swallows around a lump in his throat.

“Looks like I got a new roommate,” he whispers, and now he's glad he didn't call Crane because no one needs to know he just got choked up over a rat.

He keeps coaxing the rat, offering it small chips of his ice and blasting the room with liquid helium until beady little eyes stare up at him. The series of squeaks sound so offended, but when Victor cups his hands around it the rat sniffs at him curiously.

“Your fur's going to go white. I figure you're not vain or anything but thought I'd give you fair warning.” He can already see the telltale white roots beneath the mottled brown fur. “Haven't figured out that one yet.”

He picks up the rat and- and he can't really parse this right now but something about this rat having the same condition as him just feels good.

-

Victor plucks his rat out of the new cage and holds her up to give Crane a good look. “Her fur’s already changed.”

“You can pick it up,” Crane comments. He huddles down a bit more into his coat. “It awfully cruel condemning another to the same fate.”

Well he  _ was  _ planning to let Crane hold his rat (with gloves, obviously) but he just killed that chance. “It was an experiment. One that  _ worked _ .” He lets her climb up and down his arm, ignoring the tiny sting of little rat claws digging into his skin. “It’s repeatable. I can collect cell samples from the next batch to monitor for changes. If I know how the change happens I can start making progress on a cure.”

Crane peers a bit closer, blasting her with a gust of his warm breath, which she shies away from. He doesn’t blame her; It’s not exactly enjoyable for his hands either. “Anthrac-”

“She has a name.” Crane raises one brow. “Katherine.”

He blinks. “You named your rat Katherine.”

“Nora always liked the name.” Crane tips his head to the side and is occurs to him that there’s a distinct chance he’s never brought her up in casual conversation before. Pretty good reason to not start now. “I have a proposition for you. Go upstairs.”

Crane watches him warily, but he sidesteps his way to the door and leaves the lab without making Victor clarify. He runs two fingers across her back a few more times before returning her to her (admittedly oversized) cage in his private room. She settles down in a cardboard box full of a specialized bedding that doesn’t get stiff in the cold. He is spoiling this rat to no end but he’s in deep somehow and has no desire to change that.

When he joins Crane upstairs he finds him standing with a rat already in hand. The rest are peering out at him from their travel cages, but he’s more focused on his current companion. “You can take them.”

Crane looks up at him. “What.”

“They’ll skew my data points if I put them in the second trial.”

He nods his head, mouthing numbers as he counts out the cages under his breath. “I can reasonably take one more.”

“Since when do you do the reasonable thing?” Crane glares at him, and his cheeks pink up. Whatever, he’s not going to push the issue. “Guess you’ve got your Anthracis already picked out.”

“This rat isn’t white.”

“I could change that.”

Crane lets the rat crawl into his sweatshirt pocket and closes his outer coat around the holes. “Campylobactor.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Except he knows he  _ isn’t _ , but his smirk is infectious. Ha. “You’re really going to make me figure out something else for the rest of the rats?”

He turns back to the remaining cages, still keeping his newest acquisition huddled in his pocket. “Business is slow.”

“Might be my fault a little bit.”

Crane shrugs. “It’s a job.”

“If it’s still an option,” he sighs. “Would you work for one person indefinitely?”

Another shrug. He’s not real invested in the conversation anymore. “I don’t know.”

“Oh, come on. It’s a hypothetical.”

“That’s all it’ll ever be.”

Victor’s not so sure. There’s got to be a good reason Bruce hasn’t taken the golden opportunity to grab both of them after Victor’s little stunt. “Humor me.”

Crane sighs. “I’d consider it.” He looks at the rats one last time; Victor might be imagining the longing he sees there, but he hopes not. He’s not in the market to start his own rat army. “Keep them for now.”

“Great, sure. I’ll be your rat hotel.” He’s being sarcastic, but Crane nods like he’s being sincere. “You’re coming over to feed them.”

“I do that anyway.” It’s really disappointing that Crane’s learned how to snap back at him so well. He’s losing his edge. “If your hypothetical was a thinly veiled offer I’m afraid it wasn’t very convincing.”

“No,” or at least it wasn’t at first, “but if you’re interested, just how good are you at modifying clothes?”


	10. Chapter 10

Getting a call from Bruce to come to the Manor feels an awful lot like getting called to the principal’s office. Except the principal is younger than him and the inevitable punishment may include being locked in a basement for an indeterminate amount of time. Or if he’s lucky maybe he has Gordon there waiting for him so they can haul his ass out to Arkham.

No matter the outcome, which he’s sure will be bad to some degree, he’s covered his responsibilities for the next foreseeable future. Crane will feed the rats and keep the second phase of his experiment going. And maybe he can get some sort of work release if he promises to only stay in his lab and work on a cure. It’s not likely, but he can try. Going to the Manor is already a sign that he’s at least pretending to cooperate.

The kid is the one to answer the door, which disarms him but also puts him on edge. Dick’s as chipper and friendly as ever, spouting off a few, “holy cow’s” and similar variations. But his little sunshine routine could be a ploy, even if he doesn’t realize he’s being used as a sort of social lubricant to get Victor to let his guard down.

“So he has you in on this too?”

“Um, I’m not sure what you mean,” he stumbles. He was on a role about… something, but Victor wasn’t listening. Smoke bombs, maybe. “I mean, if you mean the new equipment he uses I guess that’s sort of like being in, but I don’t turn eighteen for another three years. So I guess I’m only sort of in for now.”

They really weren’t on the same page at all, but this feels like a good segue. “Why do you even want to patrol?”

He is genuinely curious about this. Dick could live the rest of his life as the billionaire brat’s billionaire brat and not have to lift a finger. Instead he’s toiling away in the Batcave making new gadgets and hosing Scarecrow puke off Victor’s van. Feels like he drew the short straw, except no one was asking him to draw in the first place.

Seeing this kid get all quiet and mopey feels a lot like another (sort of but not really a) teenager in his life, only bad. Dick isn’t designed to be depressive. “I guess, I don’t know. I guess I want to stop someone else from losing people.”

It’s really humbling for this fifteen year old to have a stronger moral compass than him, and he’s not even being paid. “Okay.”

He's not very good at pep talks.

Dick leads him into Bruce’s study, which only amplifies the principal feel to this meeting, because Bruce is waiting for him there. He’s going through his mail, but he tosses it to one side when they come to a stop in the middle of the room.

“Thank you, Dick,” which is Bruce’s way of telling the kid to clear the room so Victor can get a proper scolding. “Good afternoon, Victor. I’m afraid I’m rather busy today, so I’ll get to the point of this meeting. I need you to pass along an apology.”

“What.”

“I’ll explain,” he says. “I shouldn’t have tried to take advantage of the situation when you brought Jonathan Crane here for help.”

Victor glances to the doorway and back to Bruce. “What?”

“I’m not sure why this is confusing for you.”

“I thought I was going to be arrested.”

“Oh,” Bruce laughs under his breath. “It crossed my mind a few times while my legs were thawing.”

“Would you believe it if I said I was having an off day?”

“You froze his leg to stop the bleeding. I think an off day is understating it a little.” Yeah, he's going to concede that point. “I trust he's recovering well.”

“He's been around.” And he's been turning part of Victor's upper lab into some sort of rat sanctuary whenever Victor isn't looking. “He’s a bit of a shithead, but that's not really new. He'll live.”

“I've decided to wait until he acts.” And to not laugh at Victor's commentary but that's fine. “He's been quiet lately. There's always the chance he's just planning his next scheme, but I can't shake something he said.”

“Get this bullet out of me?”

Sure, now he laughs. “No, although I'm sure he was thinking it. He told me he's tired. He fell asleep almost immediately after but,” he shakes his head, “I don't know. Something about it felt like a declaration.”

_ “I'd consider it,”  _ Crane said. Maybe he already has.

“Could go either way.”

“I'll keep hoping for now.”

-

Victor agrees to around for a few hours because past him was thoughtful enough to say he'd make it up to Dick for walking Crane's vomit off his van the other day. It's not awful, but the kid's so damn upbeat. It's exhausting to be around him for more than a few minutes. And, added bonus, it turns out making things up to Dick just means he's letting the kid interview him about the Rogues he's worked for. It all feels awfully familiar.

“Two Face is pretty low tech,” he explains. “Last time I worked for them I think big gun was as fancy as it got.”

“So nothing to override,” Dick mumbles as he takes notes. “You're  _ sure _ they don't use anything an EMP can effect?”

“Lighting?” he guesses. “I'll be honest, kid, Two Face is pretty old school.”

“It's hard to cut down on carry weights when I can't combine any of the equipment.” Dick tosses his pen onto the counter and leans back in his chair. “It's not like Bruce can't handle it, but holy crap, some nights he carries almost thirty pounds of equipment on top of the weight of his armor.”

“And you want to get into this business?” Dick can't weigh more than a hundred pounds soaking wet. Putting on armor could make him fall over. “He has to  _ pay _ me to be out there.”

“My dad always said I'd hit my growth spurt late, but I don't know,” he shrugs. “He wasn’t super tall. My mom was short too.”

“You're harder to hit. Smaller target.”

Dick sighs. “Yeah I guess so.” He chews on the inside of his cheek and looks down as his notes. “It’s just, Bruce is way stronger than I am, too. I learned trapeze growing up, but I can't, like, pick up a  _ person _ . I can hardly lift fifty pounds!”

“You still have me beat. I can't remember the last time I jogged.”

“I find that hard to believe,” Bruce says from across the room. He sets down an unreasonably large set of weights and grabs a hand towel to wipe at his sweaty face while he walks over. “I'll accept that you don’t tend to run, but jogging? You've gotten in enough trouble to have to move faster than a slow walk.”

“I don’t have to run if the person trying to catch me is frozen.”

“That’s a fair point,” Bruce concedes. He pulls up the third chair by the counter and sits on it backwards. “And it must work well considering your track record.”

“Can’t argue with results.” Victor drags the notes closer and skims the list of Rogues Dick has yet to ask about. “There a reason I’m on the list?”

“Oh no! It’s not like that!” Dick flounders, and Bruce just lets him. “Honest, oh jeez, I just wanted to ask about the backup cooling system. I didn’t want to forget.”

“I have a guy looking into it.” He adds a belated “Crane,” when they won’t stop staring him down.

Bruce’s eyebrows shoot up. “Really?”

“He homebrews all of his equipment,” Victor shrugs. “Integrating it is the easy part,” or so he’s been told, “but he’s not used to working with something as finicky as my coolant.”

Bruce gets a faraway look on his face, and then he slips back to reality after going on a little face journey. “Dick, why don’t you see if we have anything you think would withstand extreme cold without cracking.”

“Yes sir!” Dick exclaims, and he bounds off to another area of the cave.

“I’m pretty convinced he’s not secretly your bastard child.”

“I’m glad?” Bruce chuckles. “What gave it away?”

“He smiles, and it’s not forced.”

And the tense smirk Bruce tries to pass as a smile is wiped off his face. “That’s not a familial trait.”

“You’d be surprised.” He checks to see if Dick is on his way back, but he suspects the task he’s been given will take some time to complete. “He’s going to be eaten alive if he starts going on patrol.”

“I know,” Bruce sighs. “I have three years before Jim would even consider letting him join me to figure out a way to convince him not to.”

“You could always ground him.” Maybe he should list bringing down the room as a secondary power because he really sucked the fun of out Bruce with that smile comment. “So, what’s the ideal?”

“Every rogue simultaneously decides to take up a less destructive hobby and stops terrorizing the city.”

Lofty. Idealistic. Feels like a Bruce Wayne goal. “Even you?”

Bruce doesn’t respond right away. He rubs his right hand over a nasty scar on his forearm, twisting over the garled and discolored skin. “You consider me a Rogue.”

Victor shrugs. “Loosely. We’re not that different. You just have a more positive end goal.” And maybe that’s a good thing. A fight fire with fire sort of mentality, or something along the lines of thinking like the enemy. “And Gordon’s go ahead, but he was getting desperate.”

It’s probably not the best idea to keep jumping up and down on such thin ice, but Bruce isn’t angry when he asks, “do you know what stops me from being just like the rest of the Rogues?”

Victor shakes his head. “Not really.”

“Me either. I just hope there’s something.”

-

There’s something very calming about returning to his lab just to mix a few chemicals. It isn’t groundbreaking and dedicating time to producing a coolant means he’s not spending time studying the cell changes so he can work on a cure, but he can blast his music as loud as he wants without it becoming a distraction to his thought process. The procedure isn’t very difficult or sensitive, and there’s a tangible sign of success when he’s done.

Resultless research really drains the life out of him sometimes.

The only downside is he gets engrossed in his work, so when he turns around to use his centrifuge he about drops the bottles when he finds Crane standing there, loudly breathing out puff after puff of hot air, probably for the added visual. “Jesus Christ,” he swears under his breath. Crane’s satisfied smirk is the embodiment of the cat that ate the canary; he definitely undersold just how much of a shithead this guy can be when he's in the right mood.

“Yuck it up, it's not happening again.” He moves past Crane to load his new centrifuge, which has the courtesy of opening when he pushes the automatic door button and also doesn't try to melt his walls. “You should really learn to knock.”

“I did,” Crane shouts theatrically over his music.

Victor sighs and moves over to his stereo and turns doesn't his speakers until his metal playlist is doesn't to a whisper. “Is there a reason you came over here or are you just messing around?”

“Earlier today a young man left a mysterious package at my door.”

Oh no. “Tell me you didn't kill him.”

“He was ephemeral. He skulked away before I had the chance to investigate.” He pulls a grainy print out out of his coat pocket and hands it to Victor. “It's unfortunate for him that I've maintained my security system.”

“I know this kid,” it's a shitty angle but there's a certain way Dick carries himself that broadcasts loud and clear in the image. “He's Bruce Wayne's adopted teenager or his ward or whatever they're going with. He's in on the secret.”

Crane goes from pleased to pissy in a second flat. “I find it troubling that you decided to leak my address to your phantasmic employer.”

“I didn't.” And Crane looks like he believes him, and maybe like he's going to throw up again. Saving him from Arkham bought him some serious trust points. “Did you open it?”

“I opted not to, given the mystery.”

“Go wait for me in your lab,” he says. His nervous breathing is going to fuck with the humidity in his lab if he doesn't knock it off. “And don’t destroy the box. I have a couple ideas of what might be.”

If he's right then Dick must have come through on his promise to find Victor a suitable material for the tubing. If not, then things are going to get interesting. He brings his freeze gun over just in case. Crane looks grateful for his forethought; he uses the blunt end of his scythe to push the box closer to Victor, and though Victor side eyes him for being overly cautious he still takes extra care when cutting off the tape holding the lid down.

“Put that damn thing away,” Victor says, “and come over here. It's just parts.”

Actually it's a lot of parts. The box is big enough for Dick to settle in and not even feel that cramped. There are five giant spools of a flexible walled tubing and a smaller box that Crane just can't keep his grubby hands off of. He pops it open and pulls out a single rectangular power supply.

“These are high quality,” he marvels. “Your boss is an awfully generous man.”

“Don't get greedy. I had the kid research materials for my alternative suit. Your gift is the gift of something I'll pay you to work on for me.”

Crane's thoroughly distracted by the power supply. He pops off a small connector port cover and holds an end of the tubing up to it; perfect fit. “I may have to pick his brain.”

“It's so sinister when you say it.”

“The power supply will be easily disguised as an insulin pump, or other similar medical devices.”

“That's kind of what it is anyway.”

Crane returns the power supply to the box and jogs over to his lab workspace. He uses one arm to sweep some wires and scrap bits off the center of the large counter and pulls out a wrinkled sheet of sketch paper. He sits on a tall stool and starts drawing something; by the time Victor's made his way over with the box in hand he's finished a rudimentary design for a shirt and pants with embedded tubing.

“Try doing a hat too.”

“That will require smaller components.” He uses a whole two lines of pencil to draw a beanie in the corner of his paper.

“I'll send a message to the kid.” He watches Crane fill in the hat drawing with rings of tubing. “How about shoes? I'm not a fan of walking on hot coals.”

“Hollowed soles,” he mumbles. “Something with excess height and durability I can carve into. Hiking boots maybe.”

“You're going to make me look like an asshole.” Crane's pencil stops moving and he tips his head back to look up at Victor. “I've never been hiking in my life.”

“You could start.”

“I have no desire to do that.” He sidesteps so he can lean on the counter to get a closer look. “Do you think we could avoid the steam cloud that floats around my face at all times, or is that pretty much a guarantee?”

“It might be.” He makes little notation next to the shirt design, something about breathable fabrics. “They don't use the same cooling method, but I'm afraid it may be avoidable.”

“Where’d you learn to do this?”

“I’m mostly self-taught.”

“Mostly?”

Crane is content to ignore his question in favor of adding more details to his hat design. Victor nudges him in the side with his elbow and he sighs tiredly. “Jervis.”

“Really?” Victor exclaims. Crane grumbles under his breath. “He taught you well.”

He’s all pink cheeked and grumpy; it's a trend whenever his oddball friend gets brought up. “Integration is painfully simple, but doing it well is horrid without a guiding hand.”

“He has an eye for detail.” Among other things.

Jervis and Victor never really clicked the way he and Crane do. He's a little too much for Victor to want to deal with, but Crane's always gravitated to his whimsical way of enacting his own unique brand of chaos. They're pretty insufferable as a pair; Crane is far more palatable after he's broken free from Tetch's influence.

“How long do you think this will take?”

“At least a week.” Crane's found doodling little scribbles in the corner of his sketch paper a better use of his time then actual progress. He's getting all moony over a stylized top hat. Time for Victor to go. “Maybe longer if I don't get the components right away.”

“I'll talk to them when I get back to my lab.” He pushes on the table to right himself. “Since you're making one set you should make more.” Crane goes as far as swiveling on his chair to glare at Victor. “Don't. I'm paying you. This is me telling you I'll pay you more.”

Crane rolls his eyes, but he doesn't argue. He eases back around and leans over his work, sniping at Victor over his shoulder. “You’re being awfully demanding. Are you going to insist I use certain colors too?”

“Blue really brings out my eyes.” Crane snorts. “I really don't care as long as you don't try to dress me like you.”


	11. Chapter 11

It takes three weeks. Three agonizing weeks of Crane showing up at his lab for a fitting, attempting to put on the apparatus only to have it be too loose around his neck or too tight in his legs. On time, majoly depressing, it just didn't fit at all, and Crane demanded he finally just let him get some proper measurements. They spend another two days arguing about it until Crane dug up some fancy gloves that keep his nasty hand heat in and away from Victor's heat sensitive body. He asks for a pair for himself.

He's always hated clothes shopping, but this is happening in his home where he's supposed to be free of this garbage. He's looking forward to the day when he can just pull on these stupid clothes and not have to think about the process that made them come to pass.

Crane doesn't stick around when he drops off a prototype. He knocks once and leaves the package by the door, a medium sized box with the flaps folded in and a single note telling Victor  _ fuck you _ in all caps. He huffs out a laugh and drags it inside, and then he proceeds to stare at it for the next two days without even pulling it out of the box.

See, testing to see if it works is easy. He pulls it all on, steps outside to see if he feels like he's going to die, and goes back in or walks over to Crane depending on the outcome. Should take ten minutes at most.

But he's having a hard time parsing the details of whatever mental block he's developed against using the new cooling equipment. They look like normal, generic clothes. Crane's managed to hide the tubing along seams and utilized thinner capillary tubes through the panels of a big, bulky knit sweater. The cargo pants he settled on have at least seven pockets, one of which hides the small power supply. Even the boots look normal from the outside. It isn't until he peels back the inner sole that he finds the coils of cooling tubes in the hollowed out heels.

The hat's a work in progress. He's been whining about the look, something about it not lying flat enough with the tubing he's currently using. But Victor's not sure he needs one. He doesn't use anything with his current suit, just relies on the cool air dissipating out the top to keep his head properly cooled. It would just be nice to hide his hair without sweating to death.

His phone buzzes in his pocket interrupting his valuable time, which he's been using to pick at one of the loose threads on the sweater. He knows it's probably Crane demanding his approval or concerns over the prototype. He can't imagine what being scolded by Crane will do to his admittedly shitty mood.

So he pulls on the sweater. And then changes into the pants and shoes. Everything fits well, nothing's trying to cut off any blood supply; he should have let Crane take his extra measurements earlier.

He should have tried these on when Crane gave them to him two days ago but there's not a lot he can do about it now. He switches on the three power supplies, pulls on a pair of gloves, and takes one last refrigerated breath before opening his lab door and stepping outside.

His one complaint is how warm his hands feel compared to the rest of him. A cold patch in his gloves should fix the issue. There's also a bit of condensation rising off of him but it's not as bad as the suit's cloud. He's not the strangest thing the citizens of Gotham have ever seen.

He feels naked. He also feels comfortable. It's creating some heavy dissonance he wasn't prepared to deal with.

He could just… go to the store. Or on a  _ walk _ . He doesn't want to, but he could, and no one would bat an eye.

Victor makes it about halfway to Crane’s door before he has to slip into an alley. He just- he needs a minute. This is closer than he’s been to being his old self in over a decade.

He’s not sure what to do with this much freedom. He settles on showing it off.

It takes a good minute for Crane to answer the door. He's missing his glasses, hair more of a mess than normal (if that's somehow possible), and if he looked more awake Victor would say he's glaring. He takes out his phone and, well, the part where it's two in the morning clears up a few things. “Oops.”

“You can't imagine the horrific ordeal I go through in order to fall asleep.”

“If I didn't know better I'd have assumed you just don't do that.” Crane rolls his eyes, but he sidesteps and lets Victor enter his lab. “Be blunt, how bad am I condensing up the air right now?”

Crane holds up a hand and stumbles back through his security door towards his bedroom. Victor waits patiently while he does whatever, and he comes back looking slightly more human now that he's not squinting at everything.

“So am I a fog machine?”

“I can add a layer to dampen the effect,” he leads Victor to his work table and scribbles down an incomprehensible note on the corner of a piece of paper. “It isn't horrible.”

“I didn't think so. Only complaint is the gloves.” He pulls one off and holds it by one of the fingers. When he shakes it little snowflakes fall out the bottom and drift to the floor. “My hands are sweating.”

“You survived the walk over,” he says through a yawn. “And you aren't releasing an appalling amount of condensation.”

“I'd call it a success.”

Crane reaches past a few miscellaneous tools and pulls out an inside out beanie loaded with tiny tubes filled with coolant. He flips it the other way and offers it to Victor. “The Batman's charge delivered my requested components. I trust this new design will alleviate the unpleasantness of the last.”

“You're the one that hated it,” Victor says under his breath. He pulls on the hat and God damn, the cooling effect is instantaneous and very pleasant. “I hope you didn't want this back.”

“I’m satisfied when a client is satisfied.” And he holds out his damn hand, wagging a few fingers until Victor pulls a wad of twenties out of his pocket and slaps them down on his palm. “I'm not going to deny you the right to enjoy this witching hour but I've been fighting a wicked headache because of a demanding job. I'm afraid I'll have to kick you out.”

“You're funny.” He doesn't laugh. Neither does Crane. “How much would you hate me if I wanted you to make a hoodie?”

“And to think you used to find my style abhorrent,” Crane adds another scrawl to his notes.

“I don't think you can claim its your style when every college student has it too.” Crane grunts dismissively. He’s not really focused on the conversation anymore. “Go back to bed, you're bringing down my mood. I need to find an audience that will match my level of enthusiasm.”

-

He has to move his van seat up a few inches before he can drive properly. And he about plows through a wall because his feet are five times lighter now that they’re not locked up in the heavy boots of his suit. It feels like a reasonable scenario; he’s put off making his condition more livable for God knows why (he knows but he hates thinking about it) only to end up in a horrific car accident twenty minutes after he’s given semi-normal life another shot.

But he makes it to Wayne Manor without any more mishaps. Although he finds a whole new set of problems that leave him sitting in his van in the driveway, at a loss to the point where he's mildly distressed.

There's a 30% chance he didn't think this through, because it's three in the morning now and even Bruce has to sleep eventually. None of the lights in the Manor are on, and no excited teenagers or polite guardian butlers to welcome inside while Bruce does whatever he does at 3 AM.

Okay, so he didn't think this through at all, but he felt a little bad for waking up Crane and- and he doesn't know why he's here but the cooling clothes working has him wired.

He doesn't know what he's looking for. Excitement? Approval? He doesn't know.

But he's not going to get them sitting in his van feeling sorry for himself. Victor turns it off and pockets his keys, something so uniquely familiar and foreign that he has to lean against the driver's side door for a second to settle down. The excess mobility is fucking him up a little; he's adapted to the ten degrees of motion his suit allows and how to work around it. How the hell does he deal with being able to move his arms?

Victor does something he hasn't been able to do in a good long while, he finds a decent spot on Bruce's stoop and sits against the wall with his knees high enough to comfortably rest his arms on them. There's a pair of squirrels darting around on the ground and up the numerous trees in the front lawn. He watches them for awhile and savors the quiet.

A dark mass of armor and fabric drops off the roof without warning and Victor about has a coronary. Bruce has perfected surprise entrances, and he's doing his menacing vigilante routine as he stalks towards Victor. The moment he actually recognizes him is obvious in his stutter, and once they're about twenty feet apart he pulls off his cowl.

“Evening.”

“I sincerely thought you were a burglar. I was actually impressed you'd managed to get past the security gate without raising an alarm.” Bruce offers a hand to Victor and he takes it. His heart's still trying to outpace a stock car. “I know it's you, Victor, but I still hardly recognize you.”

“Hiding my hair helps,” he says. Victor lifts the edge of his hat up enough to let some of his hair show, and he pulls it back in place when the warm night air makes his forehead sweat.

“I'm not a therapist, but,” Bruce bites off the next thing he was going to say, “sorry.”

“I don't really think statements that have that sort of preamble should be finished.”

Bruce chuckles. “This is good, Victor. I don't have to be a professional to see that and be happy for you.”

He shrugs one shoulder. “It's different.”

“Different can be good.” He sidesteps Victor and pulls out a key for the front door. “Did you want to come in? I know it's late.”

“I can't sleep anyway.” He waits for Bruce to open the door and steps inside behind him. “Never had a great circadian rhythm.”

“I have some experience with that,” Bruce says. He meanders through the Manor, shedding pieces of armor on various surfaces until he's reached the entrance to the Batcave. Bet Alfred loves that. “This is why I worry about sending him out on patrol.”

Victor follows the line of Bruce's finger until he sees what exactly worries him. Dick's curled up under a decorative throw on the cushion in front of the large window, glasses still on and a book dangling out of his hand with the threat of falling. He waited up for Bruce to get home. Bruce pulls off Dick's glasses and picks up the book, setting both on a small end table near the wet bar.

“Cute.” It's like a kid at Christmas. “Happen often?”

“Often enough to cause concern,” Bruce sighs. “He'll be fine there.”

Bruce opens the stairway to the Batcave and leaves it open after they've both descended into the main cavern. He deposits the rest of his armor on a table near his computer system, and Victor has no desire to figure out how much or how little he can wear under his suit, so he goes over to a bench full of similar components to the ones currently keeping his temperature regulated. His snooping is interrupted by Bruce's bare feet slapping against the stone; he's pulled on some loose fitting sweats. And yet Crane somehow thinks  _ he _ popularized the sloppy look.

“I don't need to ask if the components Dick selected are sufficient.”

“They've survived the first trial,” he sets down a small motor among the scattered parts. “He's a smart kid.”

“He's very bright, and he picks up new skills quickly. I'm glad I could foster it in some way.” He picks up a wire splitter and turns it over in his hands. Something to fidget with. “I tried to get him out on patrols right away.”

“Tried?”

“Gordon stepped in. Said a teenager had no business risking his life for the city.” Bruce chuckles darkly. “Fool him once.”

“Does he know?”

“I don’t actually know,” Bruce says. “He’s never told me so at least.”

Victor nods. “But you think he knows.”

“There’s enough evidence he’s personally seen to suggest he knows or he’s not a very good detective.”

Well now he kind of hopes Gordon doesn’t know, and that he can be there the day he finds out. And that he remembers to take a photo because having that kind of pick me up sitting around at his disposal would do wonders for his mood.

“So, if he knows,” which, as much as he’d love the alternative, he agrees with Bruce. There’s no way Gordon hasn’t pieced things together. “Why keep up the pretense?”

“Security,” Bruce says, “people might try to listen in. They already  _ have _ listened in.” He goes on a little face journey to somewhere dark and unpleasant. Victor fiddles with a few of the rainbow wire cables and waits for him to come back to the Batcave. “Something is happening.”

“Sounds ominous.”

“Joker, Valeska-” he huffs and has to stop. Man, rainbow wire has never been so interesting. “There’s been a rash of individuals attacked using the Joker Venom. We’ve never managed to synthesize an antidote, and it’s proven to always be fatal.”

“Crane made it for him.”

He’s not sure why he said that.

Bruce nods to himself. “That makes sense. Valeska’s past experience isn’t chemical.” He wanders off to another part of the cave, still muttering to himself about Valeska and Crane. From across the room he shouts, “Crane designed it himself?”

“Valeska told him what effect he wanted,” Victor shouts back. He waits for Bruce to come back before he continues. He’s brought along a giant folder, and he slaps it down on top of the miscellaneous parts and flips it open. It’s victims, dozens of them. “Oh.”

“I need to talk with Crane.”


	12. Chapter 12

They’re literally halfway out the door when there’s this tiny yawn behind them, and Victor finds Dick trailing after them. He’s somewhere between half and mostly still asleep, with wild fluffy hair  haloing his head and the throw from the bench cushion over one shoulder. Poor kid couldn’t even find his glasses.

“We’re doing reconnaissance,” Bruce tells him. “Low profile work.”

“But who’s,” he squints, and his eyes about bug out of his head. “Holy crap I didn’t know it was you!”

“You did good work, kid.” Victor offers out one gloved hand and Dick shakes it, sloppy from sleepiness and his overflowing enthusiasm.

“Gosh, I didn’t know it would come together that fast,” he marvels at Victor’s ultra ordinary outfit. From an outside perspective this has got to look humorous. “And they’re working right? I had to retrofit the smaller power supplies he wanted for your hat.”

“Doing fine, nothing to lose sleep over.”

“He’s right,” Bruce coaxes Dick out of the foyer, giving him a gentle nudge towards the hallway. “We’re going to have a late night.” It’s practically day now. Sky’s getting awfully light around the edges. “If there’s anything you can do from here to help one of us will call.”

Victor doesn’t want to stand around waiting all day, but the two of them are exchanging some sort of family moment, so he waits to cough until they’ve gotten a good ten seconds out of a hug. Dick shuffles away to go sleep, or at least humor Bruce, and they both pile into Victor’s van so they can go wake up the crabass and confront him about his most inconsistent yet somehow reliable client.

“You should let me do the talking,” Victor tells Bruce once they’re at the halfway point. The city isn’t sleeping, it never is, but it’s pretty empty on the roads leading to his neighborhood. “I know you have some experience with dealing with teenagers but he can be a handful.”

Bruce is really struggling with his response to Victor’s request. “I’m fairly certain Jonathan Crane is older than me, and I’m in my twenties.”

“Maybe physically,” Victor says. He parks his van across the street from Crane’s place and kills the ignition. After some hesitation he grabs his freeze gun. Having something non-lethal on hand feels like a good move. “This should be interesting.”

“I’m hoping that’s a good thing.” Victor takes the lead and kicks his fancy cooling boots against the door twice; it isn’t any sort of secret knock they’ve established but the toes are reinforced with something so it’s nice and loud against the fancy metal security door. “Is there any merit to having me stand out of sight?”

“He knows we’re both here. Probably better if you don’t try to hide.” Victor points two fingers up at the camera Crane’s hidden in the crevasse made by a crumbling brick. For good measure he waves, which may irritate Crane or maybe it’ll inspire him to hear them out before he goes for his scythe. “He’s big on personal security.”

The door pops open wide enough to see that there’s no one on the other side. Victor closes his eyes for a second and just breathes; it’s fine, they’ll be fine. He’s trying to spook them with the old haunted door routine but Victor _knows_ he has a remote system in place to open his door without having to be there. The bigger concern is the fact that Crane’s resorting to this method of security rather than just _leaving the door shut_ , so this will be fun.

“You’re only scary when you have your mask on,” Victor calls out into the room. The only lights on are Crane’s copper wire bulb, but Victor switches on the secondary lighting to kill the spooky mood. There’s honest to God ambiance music playing from somewhere and he wants the secondhand embarrassment to just kill him already. “Dollar bin at the Halloween shop? Really?”

Nothing. It’ll be easier to drag him about the soundtrack once they’re face to face. “This is somehow exactly as I expected and nothing like I imagined.”

“Kid has a talent and it’s confusing people to no end,” Victor says. He lifts his freeze gun up so it’s resting on his shoulder and keeps his free hand in his pocket to appear casual. “Crane, we just want to have a chat.”

This is well beyond ridiculous. “I know you’re not going to gas us so unless you’re planning some sort of sneak attack-Jesus Christ you have got to be kidding me.”

He swears he’s watching everything in slow motion. Bruce isn’t looking at the second security door, so he doesn’t see Crane slipping out of his bedroom. Victor doesn’t register his hands reacting until he’s already pulling the trigger of his freeze gun, and the blast freezes Crane’s hand around his scythe, but the impact of it actually sends his hand and the scythe into the wall and makes it stick.

“Chill,” Victor tells him, and he’s more offended by the pun than the actual act. It’s impressive given the death stare he was already giving Victor for the freezing. “We’re going to be civil.”

Crane gets one of those trapped animal looks in his eyes, the ones that mean the animal is about to gnaw their arm off to escape. He tugs the hood of his coat over his head far enough to cover up his forehead and provide some dark shadows over his face. It’s going to take some effort to coax him out of this.

Victor waves a hand at Bruce and points to one of the many wooden chairs scattered around Crane’s lab. He’s not too far gone, responds to Bruce’s gentle insistence that he sit down, but he’s not very helpful beyond that.

“Do you have a heat gun?” Nothing, and Bruce is even asking nicely. “I’ll see what I can find.”

“We’ll be here.” Victor sets his freeze gun against the wall and drags a wooden crate over using his boot. He tips it upside down to use it as a chair and peers up at Crane’s face through the shadows and his wild hair. Still not great, but he’s settled into a quieter panic. “No one’s here to arrest you.”

Crane side-eyes his hand and gives Victor just the _worst_ accusatory look. “Really.”

“Just keeping you from doing something stupid.” Crane retreats into his coat just a little farther until his chin is covered up. “He’s going to ask you about Valeska’s jobs. Both of the Valeskas, actually.”

Crane huffs. “They’ve been few and far between. I’m afraid the man’s decided I’m more an impedance than an asset.”

“Pity.” Sarcastically, but also a bit genuine. He might not have the answers Bruce wants to hear. “I’m going to go out on a limb,” oh Crane is _not_ happy with his puns today, “and say that honesty is in your best interest. He’s a little testy. Hasn’t gotten to sleep yet tonight.”

“ _I_ was sleeping,” Crane snaps. Explains why he managed to get his ambiance just right but didn’t bother with his look above having dark clothing and some impressive bedhead.

“I’m still amazed you do that.” Crane rolls his eyes. Bad choice on his part, because Bruce suddenly popping back into his field of vision spooks him. “You ready to play nice?” Crane breathes out harshly, but he nods. Victor holds out one hand towards Bruce and accepts the hair dryer he’s found somewhere in the recesses of Crane’s lab. He plugs the hair dryer into the nearest outlet and starts blasting hot air at the edges of the chunk of ice currently holding Crane’s hand in place. He shouts so he can be heard over the sound, “he’s all yours, Batman.”

Not the right call, worst thing he could have called Bruce while Crane is still contemplating losing a hand in favor of running off to hide. It doesn’t even fit anyway; he left the armor and cowl at the Manor _because_ Batman freaks Crane out so much. Not that Crane would ever admit that.

But Bruce is some sort of secret master at calming Crane down. He gets all low on one knee and starts talking soft enough that Victor can’t hear it over the hair dryer, but Crane’s hanging on every word. It takes an age and a half, but whatever he says to Crane works well enough to keep him from tugging away from the wall and leaving his hand behind. Convenient too, because he’s made a good dent in the ice that’s keeping him tethered there. Crane’ll love being able to swing the scythe around even if he can’t let go of it just yet.

Bruce makes a vague gesture towards the hair dryer and Victor switches it off. “I’m not going to make any accusations, I just want to know the truth. Did you help develop Joker Venom?”

“I played a pivotal role,” Crane sighs. “You can’t imagine the horrors of working with such an impulsive fellow.”

“I think he has an idea,” Victor says. He gets _two_ glares and decides maybe he’s meant to just spectate this one.

“You know what’s in it,” Bruce continues. Crane’s wary, but he nods once. “And you have a lot of experience with chemistry.”

“I’ve done some self-guided research,” Crane says. Victor does a very bad job of turning his laugh into a cough. “The late Valeska’s requirements for the Joker Venom is unique, and yet very simple. His brother has done little to deviate from the original formula.”

“But he _has_ deviated,” Bruce presses.

Crane chews on the corner of his lip. It’s his turn to go somewhere else inside his head, and Victor takes the opportunity to use the hair dryer on his hand until he looks back up at Bruce. “A mild dilution delays the lethality. Keeps the horrendous laughter going longer.”

Oh. _One of Valeska's copycats was gunning for a bit of my Joker Venom at a steep discount._ It’s a cute embellishment, and probably not that far off from the truth. Valeska’s probably diluting on site; he can’t see Crane letting that kind of money slip between his fingers without a fight.

“He didn’t cut you,” Victor says. Crane glares at him and shakes his head; he doesn’t want Bruce to know. Victor nods once and turns the hair dryer back on; spectating is definitely the right call for this little meeting.

Bruce side-eyes him, but he doesn’t try to get in on the secret. “Just how much would you charge if I contracted you to produce an antidote?”

Crane doesn’t get a chance to answer before Victor finally makes enough progress on his hand to separate it from the wall. He’s still glued to his scythe, but he’s used to carrying it around without anything helping him keep his grip. It swings in a wide arc as he stands, narrowly missing Bruce and Victor as he lugs the thing with him on his way to the main workspace of his lab. Victor knows what the kid’s going for, but Bruce doesn’t, and he keeps looking between the two of them to try and get an answer. It’ll be funnier when Crane drops his estimate in his lap if Bruce doesn’t expect it, so Victor stays silent.

The list Crane gives Bruce is huge, and just about illegible without his dominant hand available for writing. But the number at the bottom is clear as a bell, and Bruce folds it once before slipping it into one of his pockets. He stands up and holds out his left hand for Crane to shake, and honest to God if he wasn’t holding his scythe right now Victor would take his picture because his shock is _priceless_.

-

He finds Crane in his upper lab three weeks later, playing with the rats he still hasn’t taken but insists he will now that Bruce is funding his main project. Victor’s still not holding his breath. Hell, he’ll sell the second floor to Crane if he wants it; he won’t need the space once his second rat trial is complete and he moves onto cure production full time. It’s not like the kid isn’t over here pretty much every day anyway.

“ _Never_ thought I’d find you here,” he deadpans. Crane has _two_ rats out this time, and they’re both making a comfy home out of the two large pockets of his zip up sweatshirt. “I’m going to start charging your rats rent if you don’t hurry up and renovate the main floor of your building into some giant rat sanctuary soon.”

“It’s not mine to alter,” he says. Right. Because Tetch is definitely going to need his space back in the near future. Whatever. “It's unnerving.”

“The space or not being in a basement?” Crane shrugs one shoulder. “Guy won't notice. Arkham's miles away.”

“I'll notice.” Well, yeah. That's kind of Victor's _point_. Crane’s done discussing it though. He goes rummaging through his pockets that don't have rats in them and pulls out three capped syringes filled with a bright orange liquid. “I have an update for our employer.”

“Looks like you have a _cure_ for our employer.” Crane shakes his hand in Victor's direction; he wants Victor to cross the room, probably wants to claim his leg is still healing. He's lucky Victor's feeling generous. He examines the triplet of syringes; pretty standard aside from the wild color of the liquid inside. “Please tell me you don't know if it works.”

“I lacked a subject suffering from the Venom,” he snaps. Gets all pink in the face too. “It works in theory. A reaction of the Venom and the cure yielded mostly water.”

“What's the other part?”

“Various salts,” he says. Victor's eyebrows shoot up. “Non-hazardous, if the notion otherwise fills you with fear.”

“You better hope so.” He tries to hand them back but Crane shakes his head. “What am I supposed to do with this.”

“You’ll see him before I do,” Crane explains. “Don't let the appearance give him false hope. I won't know if it's functional until it's tested on a proper subject.”


	13. Chapter 13

The city goes quiet, and it's never a good sign when that happens. Someone's ramping up somewhere, but until things start happening no one knows who.

There are some safe guesses: Valeska's a top contender. Kiteman got himself a fancy lawyer that got him out on a technicality. Two Face flat out escaped last week. Any or all of them are pissed at Victor for helping out the Batman, so it should be a fun time once they get off their asses and do something.

Crane's over constantly; Victor's understanding of physiology is abysmal, and the kid owes him for letting him keep the rest of the rats in his upper lab space. He's not a bad lab helper. Maybe he's Victor's assistant in a parallel universe.

There's an entire month of failures, of old equipment giving out and cell cultures liquifying the second he applies an attempt at a cure. Those days are hard; in the back of his mind he sees pale skin cracking and falling in and he has to hole up somewhere dark and quiet until the dread passes.

Some days he really does contemplate giving up on this path. He's mobile. He's relatively comfortable. Last week he went to an actual movie theater, and it doesn't matter that he hated the film and walked out halfway through because he had the option to do both those things. There's this haunting fear of his power supplies all failing, but aside from a few routine battery changes they're still going strong.

But even when Victor stops Crane doesn't, the damn try-hard, and it all leads up to this moment: Crane's shivering from the cold of Victor's lab but he's looking awfully pleased with himself, and when he slaps a full syringe into Victor's hand it makes him want to punch Crane in his smug face.

“If this is a prank I'm going to freeze you to a wall.”

“Initial cultures didn't denature,” Crane says. He's damn proud of himself, and showing Victor that the last twelve years of his life really were a waste. “Cells remain stable in room temperature. Sounds awfully real to me.”

Maybe too real. He gets a strong urge to squeeze the syringe until it snaps in his hand.

“Don’t get all disappointed because I didn’t stab it into my leg the second you said it passed the preliminary test.” Victor sets it aside on a counter and crosses the room to his makeshift rat wall and opens up the cage of Rat A. He brings it over to the table with the syringe and sets it down on the clean surface. “Last chance to admit this was a shitty prank.”

Crane rolls his eyes. “Your sense of humor is dreadful.” He removes his thick outer pair of gloves, leaving him with a thinner, more dexterous pair on, and he picks up the cure. “You’re not going to cure Katherine first?”

He looks at his bedroom door, filling in the mental picture of the cage housing his rat. He swallows around a tightness in his throat. “I don’t have cell data on her.”

Crane shrugs. He fumbles with the syringe until he manages to get the cap off, and then he administers the entire dose to the rat. Little guy is not very happy about the poke, but it settles in the little shelter Victor makes out of his hands. He rubs a single finger across the rat’s back while it chills out, but the little guy starts radiating heat and Victor has to let go to avoid burning himself.

“You son of a gun,” he mutters under his breath. Crane’s really outdone himself. “I can’t touch it.”

“I’ll bring the rat to a more suitable environment.”

“You mean you’ll go upstairs and play with the others,” Victor takes a stab. Crane pointedly ignores him in favor of picking the unfrozen rat up and depositing it into his pocket. Definitely not following lab protocol with that move. “Just write down some observations. We’ll do cell samples after it has some time to settle.”

It feels too easy. The whole year’s gradually gotten just a little bit more bearable in near imperceptible increments until it’s brought him to this exact moment.

He doesn't know what the hell he was waiting for, but he also doesn’t know what comes next. Everything, probably, and all at once. It's a little terrifying.

Crane snaps him out of his thoughts when he sends a photo message from upstairs. It's a shitty photo; it's dark outside so the edges are blurry, but the Bat Signal stands out against the inky night sky. _I didn't realize you were skipping work._

He goes to his texts from Bruce and refreshes them a few times, but his most recent one was a few days ago. Dick had his spare power supplies ready for pickup. Victor never got around to it. _Was it already on when you got upstairs?_

_Yes._

Well _that_ feels wrong and bad, but Bruce hasn't sent him a job. So he's probably dealing with this one on his own. Not a big deal, he's done solo work for years. He doesn't need Victor slowing him down or standing around like a giant beacon, letting everyone know Batman's somewhere but his less mobile sidekick can't fit on the damn ledge he's crawled up onto.

Nothing about this should have him worried. Bruce didn't want help on a job, and that's all it is, a _job_.

He hates this so much.

 _Watch the rats_ , Victor sends Crane. _Heading out for a bit._

Crane doesn’t answer, which just means he has his hands full of rats. Victor retreats to his bedroom and pulls out his suit. He leans over Katherine’s cage while he’s pulling on the bottom half and tells her, “whole night’s full of bad feelings. Ever have one of those days?”

She peers up at him and sniffs at the air, climbing to the tallest tier and reaching for the door with her little paws. He taps on them gently to get her to stop, but offers up a few freeze dried peas as appeasement for not letting her roam free. He wishes everyone else was as easily placated as her.

BW lights up his phone screen while Victor struggles with his right arm. He taps the speakerphone option and accepts the call, already thinking up a few teasing remarks he can send Bruce’s way for waiting until the eleventh hour (literally, he’s rather pleased about that) before calling Victor for help.

“Mr Fries?” Uh oh. That’s the _actual_ kid using his adopted dad’s phone while the Bat Signal is high and bright.

“Talk loud, using speaker,” Victor says quickly, and to himself, “really should be faster at this after ten years.”

“Gosh, I’m sorry it’s so late-” Does he go to bed at nine? “-but Batman, er, Bruce- gah, I don’t know what’s going on. The Commissioner keeps calling the lab phone but I’m not supposed to answer it for him in case it’s sensitive information. You aren’t with him, right?”

“Nope,” Victor lets out a tiny whoop when he gets his other arm into his suit and activates the temperature controls. He switches his phone off speaker and holds it to his ear. “He on patrol?”

“No? Or maybe yes? I got back from school late and he wasn’t here.” He gets all mumbly and shy, “I don’t know if you’re willing but, gosh, could you go look into this?”

“Already dressed,” he says. He snags his freeze gun and a couple grenades on his way out the door. “It’s just you and me tonight kid. Want to be my eyes and ears?”

“Boy would I!” Dick explaims. “I mean-”

“It’s cool.” He couldn’t do this every day but once? Yeah, he can have the kid in his ear for a night. “I bet all your electronics training includes checking out the GCPD airwaves. Figure out which goons are getting Gordon all flustered.”

“Will do, sir!” He imagines Dick doing this charming little salute before running off to sit in the big boy chair at Bruce’s computer monitors. “Do you want to talk to the Commissioner, too? I think this computer can set that up.”

“Nah, let’s fly solo until we know what we’re up against.” Because that worked real well for Bruce tonight. “Send me the details once you have them. I’ll start heading towards the city center.”

-

Of course it’s Valeska. He knew it would be; guy’s been gearing up for whatever this is for months. Dick was not a happy camper when he told Victor to head towards Amusement Mile, but he didn’t let it get in the way of helping find the fastest route for Victor to take. GCPD radio waves are full of Valeska’s goons running amok in the city, but the man of the hour has yet to appear.

He finds a nice alley to park in where his tires are guaranteed to get stolen by some of Valeska’s men. Victor doesn’t have any sort of attachment to this van; it’s just big enough for his suit to fit and still allows him to reach the pedals. Before getting out he checks his phone one last time, nothing, and reaches over to grab a few essentials out of his glove compartment: a couple extra freeze grenades, his emergency gas funds, and the first stab at a Joker Venom cure Crane made for Bruce.

Valeska’s men are ready for some sneaky guy dressed in all black to start picking them off from the shadows, so Victor waltzing in the front door and sending careful blasts of his freeze gun everywhere really catches them off guard. Guy by the door, single shot of his freeze gun. Locks don’t stand a chance against his ice and a good, strong kick. Oh, a set of three guys? Freeze grenade, and a short blast to the security cameras littering the warehouse it just good strategy.

Every part of him hates this so much. The stupid goons and the dark, ill lit warehouse, and Valeska, God, the first one was bad enough to work with but this guy is just impossible. Who the hell sells so much red paint to a guy about ten degrees past crazy?

The same damn city that sells him just about everything he needs. Damn it, he should really move to Blüdhaven. It’s too late for Gotham, the city’s fucked.

His phone buzzes in its holder, and Victor sighs. It could be Dick with a new location, it could be Crane asking where he hides his rat food. He’s not looking forward to either conversation.

It’s Crane, single line without any of his embellishments, which is fine because Victor’s stomach still bottoms out when he reads, _the rat died_.

 _Details??_ Is all he can manage. He puts his phone away before he gets a response, and ignores it when it buzzes twice in his pocket.

If he wasn't pissed off before he is now. It just… it just sucks. He can't catch a break.

His phone buzzes again, but it keeps doing it, and Victor registers it's a call with just enough time to the communicator in his ear and answer Dick. “Got an update, kid?”

“I really hope I don't get in trouble for this,” he whines. “Mr Fries? I got into Bruce's tracking system. Somebody did something to the tracker in his suit, but its last signal is real close to where you are now.”

Victor blinks a few times and takes a slow, deep breath. “Why do you know where I'm at, Dick?”

There's a long pause and a plaintive, “holy crap Bruce,” and Victor can't help but laugh. “I am so, so sorry!”

“Your guy's not as stupid as he looks.” And _sneaky_ , God, Victor's done maintenance on his suit and didn't find the tracker. “So I'm close?”

“Real close.”

“Seems like a good sign.” He scans the room for any sign of Bruce, but it's just an ice fest in here. “I might need a hint.”

“Um, you could interrogate one of his men?”

This is a once in a lifetime opportunity that Victor can _not_ pass up. He actually walks over to the nearest frozen goon to ask, “hey, so where's your boss hiding the Bat?” And he _waits_ as if the guy will respond. He doesn't. “He's not feeling too chatty.”

Dick is silent on his end of the line, but Victor can just _feel_ the bit landing, and then it _does_. “You froze all his guys already didn't you.”

“They call me Mr Freeze, not Mr Politely Asks for Directions to the Big Fight.” Dick does laugh a little bit, and Victor's mood goes from abysmal to only a little depressive. Things are looking up. “If nothing's changed on the radio he's probably still around somewhere.”

“The GCPD issued an alert to stay indoors,” Dick says, “but neither of them have shown up in the city.”

“Guess it's up to me to save the day.” He follows the trail of frozen goons he left, and lo and behold there's a higher concentration of them around a door leading to a different area of the warehouse. “I have a working theory. Keep me updated.”

“Will do!”

He could just leave, could spin some tale about how Valeska must be somewhere else in the city, but he uses the creaking metal walkways to cross the room and freezes another lock off the door, shaking his head even as he kicks it open.

“Can't believe I signed up for this,” except he _can_ , which is somehow worse.

-

The next room of the warehouse is chock full of absolute nonsense. Weapons line the walls, both long range and melee. Valeska's taken to painting in here too; more of those sinister, toothy mouths grinning surrounded by an overabundance of printed laughter. Forget Crane, _this_ Rogue is definitely a member of the aesthetic or die club.

“Ah, Mr Freeze, how nice of you to join us.” Us, meaning he _and_ Bruce, although the latter is lying on his back and not looking so hot. “I was just waiting for our friend here,” he waves a dramatic hand at Bruce, “to wake up from his little nap when you interrupted.” And the creepy smile is replaced with even creepier glare. “I'm not a fan of interruptions.”

“I'll keep it in mind.”

“Always a quick wit, this one,” he snickers. “It’s no wonder why my brother kept you around.” Bruce starts moving a bit, but he's jerky and uncoordinated; Valeska notices and turns his attention away from Victor. Bad move. “So nice of you to join the fun! What say you, Batman, how about we get this party started-!”

Bruce lunges upward, landing a solid hit on Valeska's jaw; really he could have winked or something to let Victor know he's faking being an invalid. Victor could have stayed ho- shit. That's not good.

The next few seconds go so fast Victor doesn't register them until Bruce is gasping for air, Valeska is laughing like a madman, and once again his instinct is to just freeze the problem to deal with it later. Mid laugh, which is the worst, but at least he's quiet. He jogs over- Bruce would be so proud- and bends down on one knee to put a hand on Bruce's back. “I'm guessing that wasn't pepper spray.”

And then Bruce starts laughing. Awful, full body laughs that make Victor's ribs ache just to watch. He yanks his phone out of its holder and calls Crane.

“You better not be ghosting me you piece of-hey, got a little issue,” he says, not near as calm as he'd hoped. “Where’s the best place to inject your Joker Venom cure?”

“It hasn't been tested.”

“Then I'm field testing it,” he snaps. “Time’s a factor.”

“The neck muscle,” Crane stutters out. “Avoid arteries.”

“Better hope this works or we're out of a job,” he mutters. He pulls the case with the syringe out- Jesus the laughter is _so bad_ why would Valeska want this?- and he uncaps it with his mouth. “Okay big guy,” he not so gently pushes Bruce onto his back and holds him down with one arm, “try deep breaths in three, two,” and he injects the whole thing.

Bruce gasps, taking in loud gulps of air as he struggles to undo the clasps securing his cowl to the rest of his armor. Victor helps prop him up until he can fumble his way free, and once its lying to his left he starts breathing easier.

“Told you your smile looks forced.” He couldn't resist.

“What, what did you do?”

Wow, talk about ungrateful. “Got this homebrew cure from a buddy of mine,” Crane hums in his ear, but he keeps his comments to himself, “so I guess I saved your life.”

“Thank you,” Bruce says, bewildered. He's a little worse for wear but he's breathing a lot better. “Thank you.”

“Looks like the field test was a success,” he tells Crane. “Anything to look out for?”

“Nothing horrible. He may experience some nausea.”

“What is it with you and making things that make people throw up?” And before Victor can even pray Crane is wrong Bruce struggles onto his side to vomit; Victor keeps a hand at his back to keep him from rolling.

“Sometimes the subject just dies.”

Right. He doesn't sound happy about it either. “We'll deal with that later.” Because for now Bruce is over his little trip down nausea lane but he's looking pretty out of it. Nearly dying will do that to a guy. “I know I look like a top physical specimen but I'm going to need backup to get this guy into a vehicle. Please tell me you learned to drive.”

Crane's unending silence is not a comfort, nor is his eventual response. “In theory.”

“You've got to be kidding.” Victor sighs, and he taps the communicator to call the kid. “Hey, Dick, found him. Going to need a hand out here though because he's not exactly a featherweight.”

“Oh, well, we could call the GCPD?”

“I was gunning for you just driving out here to help,” Victor crosses his fingers. The kid's smart, learns fast. He probably-

“I only have a permit.”

-this is his nightmare. “Look, I don't care which of you manages to get out here.” Victor feels stupid holding a phone to one side of his head and using the communicator with the other but the whole night's been this stupid, what's one more thing? “Cause a pile up for all I care, but I'm not spending all night in this warehouse because the only two people I know that have time to help can't drive.”


	14. Chapter 14

Gordon summons him for a meeting the next morning. Victor was wrong, _this_ feels like getting called into the principal’s office. He goes in plainclothes because he doesn’t want some sort of interrogation in the lobby, but also because he’s starting to hate his suit. It’s been reliable but the sweaters are so damn comfy.

And Gordon hasn’t seen his new cooling system so he’s hoping to freak him out a little bit.

He barges in without bothering to knock, and Gordon’s mouth drops open to complain, and then stays open when he realizes who just walked into his office. “Holy shit.”

“I’m thinking of becoming a winter wear model,” Victor tells him. He drops into a chair and savors the way it presses the cold tubes against his back. “I guess you heard about last night.”

“I heard you told Dick Grayson to drive across the entire city without a license.”

Victor shrugs. “He’s not my kid.”

Gordon chuckles. “You did good last night, Victor. You apprehended Jeremiah Valeska, and you and Crane managed to save Bruce in the process.” He shakes his head. “I never expected to have this conversation.”

“You can still back out.”

“Bruce told me you went out after him on your own.”

He squirms a little in his seat. Maybe he should go back to the suit after all. He doesn’t have the option to fidget when he can hardly move. “I’m not expecting any parade or anything.”

“I think that’s the point, Victor. You risked your life when you didn’t have to. You did _good_.”

He doesn’t have to keep saying it. “Guess this means I’m out of a job if the word’s out that I’m a goody two shoes.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” Gordon says. “Baby steps. No one’s expecting you to do this for free anytime soon.” He knows it’s supposed to make him feel better but Gordon is doing a great job of making him sound like a giant asshole. “I might consider hiring you for something at the GCPD someday.”

Victor’s eyebrows shoot up. “Thinking of adding a few Rogues to the force?”

“Maybe just as consultants,” Gordon says, wincing. Yeah, adding Victor to the beat sounds like a PR nightmare. “It wouldn’t pay near as much but it comes with benefits.”

“I don’t get sick.” But he _could_ convince a doctor to make liquid nitrogen a necessary health item. He could go for getting someone else paying so he can eat. “But I’ll think about it.”

“I have something else for you,” Gordon says, nice and random and ominous. He leans down behind his desk to grab something Victor can’t see. It’s a box with Fries, V. scrawled on the side in thick black marker. “When you went missing the bank sold your house, assets, you know, the things that are worth money. But the GCPD pulled a lot of personal effects from your house and tried digging up some extended family to send them to.”

“Bet that didn’t work out.” He can’t take his eyes off the box; hope and anxiety are bubbling up in his chest.

“Yeah, no, we never found anybody, so it ended up in GCPD’s general storage. Every once and awhile a detective would sift through it to see if they could get a read on you, but otherwise it went untouched.” He stands up and carries the box to Victor, and when he can’t seem to get his arms to move Gordon puts it on his lap. “They’re yours, so you should take them. They’re just collecting dust here, and I don’t want it getting tossed if anyone ever gets off their asses and cleans house.”

He doesn’t want to thank Gordon just yet. This could be good or terrible or maybe it’s both. Victor lifts the lid and lifts a stack of personal documents to reveal the actual contents he may or may not care very deeply about: the photographs, still in their original frames. They’re dusty but nothing’s broken. And there she is, before the diagnosis, before all the freezing and the lies and becoming who he is today. She’s smiling at the camera; Victor always hated taking photos but only when he was the subject. He could’ve taken a million of her if he’d gotten the chance.

He wipes a couple frozen beads of ice off his cheeks and closes the box. He’s not in the mood to get emotional in front of Jim Gordon.

“I never got to know Nora-”

“Don't.” He knows she'd be happy, it's why he's _not_ right now. “I need to get going.”

-

Crane's the only other person that demanded his time today, but he feels obligated to call Bruce when he gets stuck in traffic. “You ruined me.”

“Um, okay?” Oh shit it's the kid again. “Um, I guess you wanted Bruce to pick up this time.”

“That was the plan short stuff.” He glares at the back of the truck in front of him and leans back in his seat. He's going to be here awhile. “Where is Bruce?”

“Asleep. Alfred told him to slow down for at least a day, since he almost sort of died.”

“Tell Alfred good luck with that.” He feels the temptation to reach over to the box in the passenger seat and lift the lid; he shoves his hand into his sweatshirt pockets. “Did you get in trouble for driving?”

“I got grounded!” He waits, and Victor chuckles. “Gosh, it's the worst! I can't practice driving until next month.”

“You shouldn't listen to me, kid. I'm a bad influence.” He _finally_ sees an opening and, no, nevermind, some tiny smart car took his space. Jerk. “Driving is overrated, kid. I'm doing it right now and I hate it.”

“You just said don't listen to you,” Dick sighs. “It's okay. I mean, holy crap, driving alone was terrifying! I can ask Alfred to take me pretty much anywhere in the city.”

“Wish I had that.” Especially now. He grumbles as he _finally_ finds a parking spot near the diner Crane insisted they meet at. “Look, kid, I'd love to talk but I need to get going. I'm a popular guy today.”

“Okay. By Mr Fries.”

“You can just call me Victor.” And he hangs up. “Why the hell are we meeting at a diner?”

He finds Crane inside at one of the corner booths nursing a cup of coffee. He nods to Victor and takes a tentative sip, grimacing and dumping another creamer into the cup before giving it a good stir. “I don't come here for the coffee.”

“I'm not sure why you come here at all.” A waitress drops off two menus and a glass of just ice, assuring them they can take their time deciding what to order.

“We're eating.”

“ _You're_ eating.” Victor can't find anything he wouldn't have to doctor extensively before he can safely eat. Oh, except the parfait. Fruit takes on freezing rather nicely. “Guess I'm getting something too.”

He orders his parfait and an extra bowl of fruit on the side, and Crane gets “the usual”. He's here often enough to have a usual order.

“Do you secretly live here?”

“I come during off hours. The ambiance is dead at the right times, and my presence is rather noticeable. Plus, I'm a generous tipper, so I have a usual table and order.”

Victor knows he's going to regret asking this but he can't just live in the dark. “Don't tell me you wear your mask here.”

“Occasionally.”

“You're kidding me.”

“I said I'm a generous tipper.”

“No kidding.” He'd have to get paid big to let Jonathan Crane in his mask sit in the diner without some sort of privacy screen up to protect the other patrons. “So, why'd you invite me here?”

“You said we would discuss your rat problem later.” Ah, _that_ little problem. “It's later, and I was also hungry.”

“I think I need a picture of this,” Victor jokes. Crane's not thrilled with him. “So, tell me what happened.”

“Organ failure,” Crane says. He pauses long enough for the waitress to drop off their food, and shoves a couple bites of his hash into his mouth. He adds _way_ too much pepper while he continues. “Seems the cryoprotectant wasn't merely skin deep.”

“We already knew that,” but he gets what Crane is saying. They're a long ways off. “So I could change back, but I'd die in about an hour.”

“Maybe less.”

“Charming.” He takes out a small canister of pressurized liquid nitrogen and sprays the parfait and fruit with a generous layer. Crane watches him with his head tipped to one side. “Sometimes being like this is more like having a food allergy. Only the allergy is anything remotely warm.”

“You've adapted.”

“You helped.” He would never have sat in a diner crunching away at a frozen parfait a year ago. “I think I need to step back from the cure for a little while.”

Crane takes a few bites of his food, looking thoughtful. “What will you do instead?”

“Don't know yet. Might try jogging.” He won't sit it aloud to anyone but he got winded jogging over to Bruce and it was _embarrassing_. “I have a few short term ideas. You got anything lined up?”

“I've been contracted to produce more of the cure indefinitely to counteract the ghastly amount of Joker Venom still on the streets.” Victor nods, sounds reliable, and like Gordon will stay off Crane's back as long as he helps. “I'm also taking online classes.”

“College?” Victor asks, Crane nods. “Explains why you're always poor.” He glares. “It's good. What're you studying?”

“Psychology,” he says, “but not to be a therapist.”

“Figured not. What does a degree like that even lead to?”

Crane shrugs. “I don't have to think about it yet.”

Victor taps his spoon against the side of his parfait cup, he's had something percolating at the back of his mind for a few days, but he didn't know how to bring it up organically while they were still neck deep in his current research. It would have sounded like he was trying to get rid of him. “Haunted house.” Oh, Crane thinks he's teasing but boy is he wrong. “Look, so you like scaring people. It's a fact.” There's a reluctant acceptance beneath all Crane's posturing. “But you never figured out how to get paid doing it. Here's how.”

“With a haunted house.”

“Use that fancy degree you're getting to really scare the pants off people.”

“This still sounds like something the city tends to frown upon.”

“Not when it's advertised correctly.” It's loose semantics at best but it's working in their favor. “You get good enough and people from the whole state will come to Gotham to pay you to scare the piss out of them. They'll be paying you so they can pee themselves in public.”

Crane gets this shit eating, sinister grin on his face, and it's dissolved in an instant when the waitress returns with their bill. Victor snatches it away from him and pulls a twenty and a ten out of his pocket.

“That's awfully generous.”

“Yeah, well maybe I know you won't like my next idea.” Crane eyes the bill, but he doesn't exchange the money out for his own. “I'm going somewhere you'll like in theory. C'mon,” he stands and gestures for Crane to follow him, “I can promise it won't be fun, but you might be inspired.”

-

Crane looks like he wants to leap out the van's passenger side window when Victor pulls into the parking lot of the Gotham City Cemetery. He side-eyes Victor, and he shrugs. “I've been meaning to come here.”

“Why.”

“I miss my wife.” He swallows thickly and clears his throat. “You lived in Gotham your whole life, right?” Crane nods once. “I bet you got someone out there too. Humor me for a few minutes.”

The reality is Victor's a little worried he'll get too worked up to drive, and even a disaster driver like Crane is better than nothing if he's too upset to see the road and any hapless pedestrians in his path. He leaves Crane in the van; he honestly doesn't care if he even gets out, the choice is his. Victor's more focused on bringing some flowers to Nora's grave.

It's modest. He wasn't around when it needed picked out, and he wasn't present at her funeral, but the stone is well cared for and clean. Victor lowers himself to the ground and taps the blooms of the flowers against the base of Nora's headstone.

If he talks out loud he's going to make some ugly crying noises, so Victor just thinks about her, about too hot summers in their dinky apartment back in college, or the day they finally signed for their house close to Victor's work. Good memories, things he's let slip a little the past decade but can still recall when he thinks hard enough. The photos help.

Out of the corner of his eye he sees Crane shuffling over to a pair of gravestones a few rows away. He's mumbling something at them, and doing a better job than Victor at keeping his composure. And then he kicks one of the headstones and Victor is reminded that looks can be deceiving.

“Gotta go keep this disaster of a guy from getting arrested,” he tells Nora's headstone. “You'd like him if you met him now.”

He drops the flowers in front of her headstone and saunters over to Crane. Karen Crane's stone is untouched, but Gerald Crane's headstone has a giant black scuff from his son's boot right down the center.

“Guess you don't miss him much.”

“I hate him.” Crane shakes his head a few times. “I am who I am because of him.”

“Charming guy.” Victor knows the details. Crane's not looking for a rehashing of the past right now. He watches Crane cross the grounds to a stone bearing the name Tetch. “Huh.”

“I'm leaving,” Crane says, which means Victor is too. They get as far as the gates before Crane curls in on himself and leans against the stone wall surrounding the property.

“I'm surprised he's still in Arkham.”

“I'm the one that helped get him out before,” Crane snaps. He rubs one reddening cheek against his shoulder.

“But not this time.”

Crane shrugs. “I'm not meant to have some nice, white picket fence life with someone. Never have.”

Well damn. “I did once.” He looks out over the plots to Nora's stone. “I don't think I'll have it again.” Crane's acting like a kicked puppy, and Victor's terrible at this but he's going to try something stupid. “I'm going to hug you.”

“What.”

“You heard me.” He hasn't done this in, God, way too long. Crane is stiff as a board and his body temp is scorching even through both their clothes. But he pats Victor's back with one hand, and for just a second he relaxes, and then they're both so over it. They separate and give each other a wide berth, and Victor turns up his cooling systems to counteract the increased heat. “Well, I'm good for another twelve years.”

“Uh huh.”

“Be brutally honest, that was the worst hug you've ever had, right?”

Crane snorts. “It's like hugging an ice pack “

“Well you're a damn furnace.” He shoves Crane's shoulder in the direction of his van. “We're never talking about this again. I don't need a reputation as some sort of sentimental sap.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to thank you guys for religiously clicking on this every time you saw the update, and for joining me in this niche hell while we all watched Victor take 42k to figure out he has friends.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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